David Fry, an Ohio man who became the designated videographer for the makeshift militia occupying the Malheur Wildlife Refuge in Oregon, says he won’t leave even after one member of the group was killed in a confrontation with law enforcement and nearly a dozen others were arrested.
In a Wednesday interview with Oregon Public Broadcasting, Fry said “we have new leaders now and new plans.”
In another interview with the Cleveland Plain Dealer, Fry said he still was prepared to lay down his life.
“I’ll pass on and move on to the next life. I don’t know (how it will end), but I’m willing to go that far,” Fry said, as quoted by the newspaper. “Obviously they are murdering people at this point. They’ve been doing it for a long time now, and you guys are watching it.”
Since being arrested, Ammon Bundy, the former leader of the militia, has urged the remaining individuals at the refuge to pack up and go home.
“To those remaining at the refuge, I love you. Let us take this fight from here. Please stand down. Go home and hug your families,” Bundy said through a lawyer, according to NPR.
Law enforcement set up a perimeter around the refuge beginning Tuesday evening, after a traffic stop turned violent and Arizona rancher LaVoy Finicum was shot and killed. Law enforcement agents have asked the remaining refuge occupants to leave and have given them the green light to go after they are stopped, identified and given a background check.
