Seeing Myself In An Oregon Standoff Suspect

Marine veteran Peter Lucier connects to David Fry, a suspect in the Oregon standoff.
David Fry was the last occupier of the Malheur Refuge. On the final morning of the standoff in Oregon, there were four holdouts left. Three surrendered to the FBI early. David Fry remained behind. He rambled on, at times incoherently, mad, frenetic, suicidal. He made insane demands. He argued biblical texts with a TV evangelist’s son. He smoked cigarettes. I listened that morning, along with thousands others, to him talk through a live-stream on YouTube.

“I’m thinking that the American people need to know, that when they’re trampling on your rights this much, sometimes it’s better to die,”