Arizona Militia Group Busted for Bogus Cocaine Theft in Undercover Sting Operation

You can’t always trust the guy who offers to arrange your multi-thousand dollar drug deals.

A security guard named Parris Frazier learned this lesson the hard way. Frazier expected to make upwards of $150,000 after robbing what he thought was a drug cartel’s load vehicle last month at an Arizona warehouse. But the whole thing turned out to be a sting operation organized by undercover FBI agents.

Frazier and his two associates, Robert Deatherage and Erik Foster, were arrested on July 22 and have been charged with conspiracy to sell cocaine, according to a criminal complaint filed in U.S. district court. Frazier was also indicted on a count of possessing a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime.

According to a local TV station, the three men were members of a local “patriotic” militia group called Arizona Special Operations Group, who had recently provided security at an anti-Muslim protest rally.

They had been under surveillance by the FBI dating back to January after Frazier spoke with Customs and Border Patrol agents during a traffic stop. At the time, according to the complaint, Frazier showed interest in contacting an informal source who the agents said gave them information on illegal border activities.

This informal source, actually an undercover agent, began contacting Frazier, who allegedly said that "he had a small group of Patriots that he trusted and they were trying to take care of (steal) anything that came up out of Mexico (drugs) or was going back into Mexico (bulk cash)." He allegedly promised a cut of whatever was seized to the undercover agent.

Frazier had violent intentions, according to the complaint. He allegedly said during a meeting "if we (his group) have to dispatch (kill) some people, we will dispatch some people,” and later offered to murder the undercover agent’s (fictitious) cousin, to eliminate the competition.

Finally, in July, the undercover agent lured Frazier to the Pheonix warehouse where he was promised there would be about 10 kilos of cocaine waiting for him in a vehicle. The agent said he would purchase the drugs off him for $15,000 per kilo. When Frazier and his two accomplices showed up to collect the drugs, they were met by an FBI SWAT team, who pursued them in a high-speed car chase and eventually chased them down and arrested all three.

The suspects are being held without bail, and detention orders for Frazier and Deatherage state that they are "a danger to the community."

That sounds about right.