2014 Las Vegas shootings

On June 8, 2014, the Millers first went to a CiCi's Pizza restaurant on foot at 11:22 a.m., Afterwards, they covered Beck with a yellow Gadsden flag and a swastika. They pinned a note on Beck's body, which read: "This is the beginning of the revolution." They also stole both officers' handguns and spare ammunition magazines. During the restaurant shooting, the Millers loudly declared to other patrons that it happened to be the start of "a revolution". Police (Officers Brett Brosnahan, Tim Gross, Zachery Beal, John Bethard, David Corbin, and Sergeant Kurt McKenzie) later responded to 9-1-1 calls and arrived at the Walmart, engaging the Millers in a gunfight (The police officers were able to locate the suspects and get information from Officers Troy Nicol and Ryan Fryman who were monitoring the CCTV of the Walmart), during which Amanda was wounded. Victims • Officer Igor Soldo, 31 • Officer Alyn Beck, 41 • Joseph Robert Wilcox, 31 ==Perpetrators==

Jerad Miller Jerad Dwain Miller (January 3, 1983 – June 8, 2014) was born in Kennewick, Washington. Jerad was arrested for multiple offenses in Washington and Indiana, starting in 2001. In 2007, he was sentenced to a diversion program after pleading guilty to a felony criminal recklessness charge. In 2009, he was arrested and charged with battery, but was acquitted later that year. In 2011, he was sentenced to two years of probation and drug counseling after pleading guilty to felony drug charges. That same year, Jerad met Amanda Woodruff, with whom he applied for a marriage license in Tippecanoe County, Indiana in August. They later married on September 22. Prior to the shooting, he worked as a street performer. He was also a fan of the decentralized police accountability group Cop Block and would share online videos of police brutality, as well as posts of conspiracy theories and anti-government rhetoric. Prior to the shooting, Jerad had accounts on Facebook and YouTube, where he made ranting posts and videos. He once posted on June 2: One month prior to the shooting, Jerad asked several other Facebook users to send him "a rifle to help stand against tyranny". Jerad was said to have been among the armed protesters who joined Bundy during the incident. According to Bundy's son, Ammon Bundy, the Millers were present during the standoff for a few days, but had been instructed by a militia member to leave due to "their radical beliefs", which did not align with the protest's main issues. They were also instructed to leave because Jerad was a felon in possession of a firearm. During the standoff, Jerad had made interviews with other protesters at the ranch, and was also interviewed by CNN, NBC News affiliate KRNV-DT, and other news stations, during which he said: Motives Jerad posted several online videos in which he was dressed as the Joker. In one video, he expressed a strong hatred for law enforcement and police officers in general, warning in an online video that they "cannot be trusted". In another, he denounced the US government as being oppressive, especially criticizing their measures at gun control, surveillance, and their treatment of Cliven Bundy. The Millers' ideology about the government has been described as "along the lines of militia and white supremacists" by a police official. During the shooting, the Millers placed a swastika on the body of slain officer Alyn Beck and hung a Gadsden flag on the crime scene; police officials remarked that this act did not signify the Millers were white supremacists, but instead was intended to associate police officers with Nazism. The Millers supported the Patriot movement, a collection of various groups with a shared ideology for limited federal government. According to Mark Potok, a spokesperson for the Southern Poverty Law Center, there was no evidence that they belonged in a specific group, but that they considered the outcome of the standoff between Bundy and the BLM as "a huge victory against the federal government", which reportedly motivated them to commit the shooting spree. ==Reactions==

Interior Secretary Sally Jewell made a statement on the day following the shootings and commented about the Millers' presence on the Bundy ranch. She said, "It's very important to bring lawbreakers to justice. There's no question that my colleagues back here, the governors of Western states, do not want people riding roughshod over the landscape ... [Bundy] had put our people in grave danger by calling in armed citizens from around the country." Nevada Governor Brian Sandoval released a statement, saying that he was saddened by the murders and called the shootings "an act of senseless violence". CiCi's Pizza and Walmart also gave their condolences to the victims, with the latter also stating that it would cooperate with police during the investigation. On social media, there has been some public praise by anti-government radicals for the killings of Soldo and Beck. As a result of aggressive anti-police posts on Facebook, there has been criticism of the site's lack of responsive action. Facebook commented through a spokesperson, "People come to Facebook to share experiences of the world around them and on occasion this may result in the sharing of content that some may find upsetting. We encourage anyone who sees content that violates our community standards to report it to us." ==See also==