He was startled to find that during his research there was a suspected terrorist training camp that was in his backyard just outside of Fresno. It was southeast of Fresno and northeast of Visalia in a very remote area of the foothills. The camp contains eighteen hundred acres and was once owned and occupied by a drug addict recovery cult. The compound has mobile homes, a huge cafeteria, buildings and a large airplane landing strip on the compound. According to all of the information he had found, it was now being occupied by a Muslim terrorist organization. To confirm Doug’s suspicions of the compound he read in the local newspaper and had seen on the news that a Fresno County Sherriff was killed on the suspected terrorist camp by a twenty year old Muslim while the Sherriff was trying to apprehend him for a simple burglary charge. (1)
Doug had no idea the Muslim organization had purchased the property and that it was a suspected training camp until he read information about it. The reports he read said it was suspected of being used by a Muslim terrorist organization to train their people in hand to hand combat, rifle, explosives, and grenades. He had been to this property a few times back in the 1980’s to check it out when the Cult group owned it and lived there. He remembered being very impressed that such a large compound had been established and hidden away in the foothills so close to his home.
Foothill neighbors of the camp have reported hearing excessive gunfire and explosions coming from the compound since the Muslims took over the compound a few years earlier. The neighbors said it sounded like there was some type of military training going on in the compound. Doug knew that because of the size of the camp it would be easy to hide that type of activity. As he read the information he thought, this training camp would be easy to sneak into and plant one of my bombs or maybe two as long as they don’t have guards on duty twenty four hours a day. Even though it was fenced with private gates along the main roads and the perimeter of the compound he would find a place to hide and just observe it for a few days. He would find out if they really did training on the camp and if they had weapons.
The camp was only about an hour drive from Visalia and up a slow, winding narrow back road. Even though it was slow traveling to get there, it had easy access from the road and it would be easy to hide his car in the trees away from the main camp entrance. Doug got up around 4:00 a.m. one morning and put on his camouflage clothing and made his way to the camp and set up his observation point before it got daylight. He spent a few days going back and forth to the camp and spying on them from in the tree line with his binoculars. It was about two hundred yards away. There was a lot of activity going on in the camp.
On the third day of observing them he noticed a group of men that marched, in what looked like a military march, with a person directing them to one of the buildings. It was located away from the cafeteria and the main buildings. Once there all the men took turns going into the building and coming out with AK’47 weapons strapped across their shoulders. Once they had their weapons they marched to a secluded area and he observed them as they did target practice. He also observed them throwing grenades and other explosives. He knew they were doing some type of training. That went on for a couple of hours and then the men marched back to the building and put the rifles away. They then marched to an area where they were receiving instructions in hand to hand combat. This training continued for a few more hours. He didn’t observe any armed guards along any of the perimeters so he assumed that maybe they felt safe in this location. The building where they stored all their weapons was his target. He figured if he blew it up the very least that would happen is it would bring law enforcement to the camp to investigate what was going on. His plan was to come back in the middle of the night and blow up the weapons building.
Before he did anything he wanted to take a little of the C-4 and an I.E.D. to the desert and use the remote control detonator and make sure everything worked. He spent a day in the desert testing the bomb and after using a small amount of the C-4 and blowing up one of the I.E.D.’s he was convinced he wouldn’t have any problem with carrying out his mission.
He waited a few days and made sure he had everything planned just right, including his escape route. Randy had a cabin up the road and past the little town of Dunlap. Doug believed that if he were to be pulled over by law enforcement he could say he was heading up to his brothers cabin or that he was coming back from the cabin, depending on which direction he was going when they stopped him.
The night of his first attack Doug was very nervous and he was pacing back and forth and going over everything in his head. As he got ready to leave he put two halves of the blocks of C-4 along with the detonators and the remote control in the metal detector bag under the back seat of his car. He made sure that all his clothing was black, including his shoes. He headed up to his target around midnight. When he got to the camp he parked his car where it was hidden and took out the bag with his bombs. He made sure everything was there, threw it over his back and stepped into the darkness. Thank goodness he had been on the property when it was daylight because when he got there it was so dark that he had to use the night vision goggles to see where he was going. He was breathing heavy from excitement and fear as he made his way to his target. Once he was out of the tree line he ducked down and stopped to take a few deep breaths. After he observed everything for a few minutes he began to low crawl on his belly and elbows the two hundred yards to the building.
When he arrived at the target building he was shaking with both fear and anticipation as he attached one of the C-4 bombs and detonator to one side of the building then he went to another building and attached another one of the C-4 bombs and put in the detonator. He low crawled back to the tree line where it was safe and he was hidden from view. Once in position he pushed the button and watched as the buildings blew up like some of the explosions he had seen in the movies. There were several huge secondary explosions from the explosives the terrorists had hidden in the buildings. He quickly made his way back to his car. Once he was at his car he put the empty bag and remote control detonator under his seat and headed back down the winding roads toward Visalia.
He hadn’t gotten far down the hill when he was motioned to stop by a guy that looked like a farmer coming in the opposite direction. He was wearing a cowboy hat and driving a pick-up truck. When Doug rolled down his window he asked, “Did you see or hear any loud explosions up the road?” Doug acted ignorant and told him that he was just coming back from a cabin up in the hills and didn’t see or hear anything. He smiled at the cowboy and said, “I can’t hear much when I have my Vince Gill CD cranked up loud.” The cowboy just shrugged his shoulders and said, “That’s strange, it was pretty loud. It woke me up from my sleep.” Not getting the response he wanted from Doug the cowboy just thanked him and quickly headed up the road in the direction of the camp. Doug later thought about it and a chill came over him and he didn’t have on any kind of disguise so he could have been easily identified if the cowboy would have reported seeing him on that lonely dark road that night. No matter how much planning he had done Doug realized this was a huge mistake. He knew that from that point on he would always have to wear some type of disguise during his attacks.
He didn’t kill any terrorists on his first attack but he had the satisfaction of knowing that it did bring law enforcement from both Fresno and Tulare Counties up to the camp. Other law enforcement was called in later that day to check things out because of the weapons that were found after the explosion. Doug knew the Muslim terrorists would have some heavy explaining to do to about their weapons they had stashed in the building he blew up. His first attack was a test and at the very least he was able to get the news media and the law enforcements attention. He also found out that he had the ability to blow something up and that gave him the confidence he needed to continue his mission. He figured, even if they didn’t shut down the camp, it would put the Muslims terrorist training camp on a high alert with law enforcement. He also knew it would be a w
hile before they could acquire and hide more weapons at that location.
The next day he watched on television as the local news reported the explosions and portrayed the people of the camp as just peaceful loving Muslims living in their little community in the foothills. The people near Fresno and Visalia were completely surprised and very angry to find out they had a suspected Muslim terrorist origination in the foothills and in their back yards. Most people were like Doug and didn’t realize this place existed before he blew up the buildings. As he watched the news reports he was disgusted if the Muslim people of this camp are such peaceful loving people, as they were claiming to be, why did they have a weapons cache and why were they training?
Doug invited Randy and Karen to dinner with him at the Depot Restaurant. During dinner he told them that he was cashing in some of his stocks and other investments and taking the motor home and traveling around the United States just like he and Shirley had always planned. He said he would be leaving within the next four months and be gone for a while before he saw them again. He told them he deeded his house to them and they could have it and all the furniture once he left. Randy and Karen were still in a little bit of shock as they left the restaurant. Once outside the restaurant Doug assured them he would he would be financially comfortable for the rest of his life. Randy shook Doug’s hand and Karen gave him a hug and they all agreed to talk again soon.
* * *
Chapter 10 - Seattle and Portland
The American Terrorist Page 9
