Three Men Plead Guilty to Conspiring to Aid Plot to U.S. Attack Power Grids
The Justice Department announced that three men pleaded guilty to aiding a scheme to attack the U.S. power grids to incite civil unrest and economic distress. Christopher Cook, Jonathan Frost, and Jackson Sawall, all pleaded guilty to the charge of conspiring to provide material support to terrorists seeking to ignite race conflict to advance white supremacy.
In 2019, Frost first shared his plan to attack a power grid with Cook in an online chat group, according to the Justice Department. Sawall was then recruited into the conspiracy by Cook, who provided him with readings that supported white supremacy teachings.
Three men were assigned to different power grids across the country and were planning to attack them with rifles. Based on their conversations, authorities determined the defendants hoped the power outage would cost the government significant amounts of money leading to unrest and a race war precipitated by the prolonged outage.
A Swastika flag with the words "Join the Front" was flown in an attempt to recruit others.
Frost supplied his co-conspirators with an AR-47 rifle and a fentanyl necklace, which they were supposed to swallow if apprehended. Despite swallowing his fentanyl necklace when the scheme was discovered, Sawall survived.
The case comes as officials from the Justice Department have pointed to an increase in domestic risks related to white supremacists and anti-government militias. As previously reported in FEDagent, the Justice Department announced earlier this year it would establish a new domestic terrorism unit, amid a growing realization that extremists within the United States pose an equal or greater threat than foreign militant groups.
The defendants face the possibility of 15 years in prison if convicted.