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Gordon Wendell Kahl | |
|---|---|
| Born | January 8, 1920 |
| Died | June 4, 1983 (aged 63) Smithville, Arkansas, U.S. |
| Cause of death | Gunshot wound |
| Resting place | Heaton cemetery,Heaton, North Dakota |
| Occupation(s) | Farmer,mechanic,tail gunner,flight engineer, political activist |
| Organization | Posse Comitatus |
| Known for | Involvement in two shootouts |
| Spouse | |
| Children | Two sons and four daughters |
| Military career | |
| Allegiance | United States |
| Service | United States Army Air Corps |
| Years of service | 1942–1945 |
| Rank | Staff sergeant |
| Battles / wars | World War II |
| Awards | Silver Star Bronze Star Medal Air Medal Purple Heart (2) Presidential Unit Citation |
Gordon Wendell Kahl (January 8, 1920 – June 3, 1983) was an AmericanWorld War II veteran, farmer andtax protester who was known for being a one-time member of thePosse Comitatus movement and for his involvement in two fatalshootouts with law enforcement officers in the United States in 1983.[1]
Gordon Kahl was born inWells County, North Dakota, on January 8, 1920, to Frederick (1886–1953) and Edna (Laudenslager) Kahl (1892–1967). Kahl had three sisters and one brother. Raised on a farm,[2] Kahl was a highly decorated turret gunner duringWorld War II, shooting down ten enemy planes.[3] After the war, "he had a 400-acre (1.6 km2) farm near Heaton, Wells County, North Dakota,[4] [but] bounced around the Texas oilfields in later life as a mechanic and general worker."[2]
In 1967, Kahl wrote a letter to theInternal Revenue Service stating that he would no longer pay taxes to the, in his words, "Synagogue of Satan under the 2nd plank of theCommunist Manifesto".[5] In 1975 Kahl organized the firstTexas chapter of the Posse Comitatus and became the state coordinator. In 1976 he appeared on a Texastelevision program with fellow tax protester William M. Rinehart and stated that theincome tax was illegal and encouraged others not to pay their income taxes.[citation needed]
On November 16, 1976, Kahl was charged with willful failure to file federalincome tax returns for the years 1973 and 1974, under26 U.S.C. § 7203. He was convicted on each count in April and June 1977, and was sentenced to two years in prison and a fine of $2,000. Kahl served eight months in prison in 1977. One year of the sentence was suspended, as was the fine, and the court placed Kahl onprobation for five years. Kahl appealed his conviction, but the conviction was affirmed in 1978 by theUnited States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.[6]
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W. M. Rinehart died of aheart attack while in prison at the same time as Kahl, who subsequently left and never returned to the Posse Comitatus group. He then became active in the township movement, an early version of thesovereign citizen movement. This movement sought to form parallel courts and governments purportedly based onEnglish common law andconstitutional law, and to withdraw recognition of the U.S. federal government. Township movement supporters attempted to organize among farmers in theAmerican Midwest during the1980s farm crisis.
On February 13, 1983, theU.S. Marshals attempted to arrest Kahl for violating his parole as he was leaving a Posse Comitatus meeting inMedina, North Dakota.[7] In the car with Kahl were his wife Joan, his son Yorie Von, and three others who had been at the meeting. According to Scott Faul's testimony, both Gordon Kahl and Yorie Von Kahl were armed withRuger Mini-14 rifles.[8] The conflict began when federal marshals created aroadblock a few miles north of Medina.[9] When the Kahl party met the marshals at the roadblock, a short but intensefirefight erupted. The gun battle left Marshals Kenneth Muir and Robert Cheshire dead, and Marshal Jim Hopson, Medina Police Department Officer Steve Schnabel, and Stutsman County Sheriff Deputy Bradley Kapp injured. Yorie Von Kahl was also wounded during the firefight. The Kahl party fired over a dozen rounds during thegunfight, while the marshals and officers fired eight. Threelawmen fired their weapons during the confrontation, and only one, Marshal Carl Wigglesworth, escaped the gunfight unharmed by hiding in a ditch.[10]
According to the U.S. Marshals Service, the Kahl party was traveling north out of Medina in two vehicles. Deputy Bradley Kapp and Marshals Robert Cheshire and Jim Hopson followed the Kahl party, while Medina police officer Steven Schnabel and Marshals Kenneth Muir and Carl Wigglesworth moved south towards Medina in two cars to intercept the Kahl party.
At one point, the Kahl party took a wrong turn off of a highway. As they attempted to back out, Cheshire blocked their escape with his vehicle, while Marshal Muir and Officer Schnabel blocked the Kahls from the north. It was then that the arrest attempt was made. The lawmen exited the vehicles with their weapons drawn and ordered Kahl to surrender. Gordon Kahl, his son Yorie Von, and friend Scott Faul exited their vehicles armed withRuger Mini-14 rifles. Gordon took cover behind his vehicle, Yorie Von took cover behind a telephone pole, and Scott Faul ran from the highway towards a set of trees, seeking better cover. Marshal Wigglesworth ran after Faul and attempted to cut him off but became stuck in a thick swamp. Meanwhile, Cheshire attempted to get Kahl to surrender, but Kahl refused and told the marshals to "back off". The tense standoff continued for several more minutes before a shot was abruptly fired by one of the men.
The U.S. Marshals Service stated that Yorie Von Kahl fired the first shot at Cheshire from behind atelephone pole. The shot struck Cheshire in the chest, fatally wounding him. Yorie Von then fired a second shot at Deputy Bradley Kapp but missed. Kapp returned fire with ashotgun and fired four times at Yorie Von, seriously wounding him in the chest and face. As Kapp turned from the downed Yorie Von, Gordon fired at least one round through the windshield of Kapp's vehicle, wounding Kapp in the forehead with glass fragments. As Kapp fell behind his car door, Gordon fired two or three more times, and a round struck and shattered Kapp's body armor. The fatally wounded Cheshire managed to fire three rounds from hisAR-15, all of which missed. Meanwhile, Scott Faul, taking cover in the nearby woods, fired at least seven rounds at Kapp and Cheshire's vehicle. One of Faul's shots hit the already wounded Cheshire a second time, and a bullet blew off Kapp'sindex finger. A third shot hit the pavement, and a piece of asphalt struck Marshal Hopson in the ear, causing Hopson to suffer permanentbrain damage.
Wounded and out of ammunition, Kapp retreated to a ditch, but was unable to reload his shotgun due to the wound in his hand.
With Kapp down, Gordon turned to face US Marshal Kenneth Muir and Medina police officer Steve Schnabel, just as Muir fired off one round from a.38 caliberrevolver. Muir's shot hit the already wounded Yorie Von Kahl square in the chest, but the bullet struck a revolver Yorie Von wore on a shoulder holster, and therefore did not enter his heart. Before Muir could fire another shot, Kahl fired one round from his rifle at Muir, killing the marshal with a shot to the chest. Schnabel tried to return fire with his shotgun, but Gordon fired three more rounds at the officer as he tried to aim his weapon. One shotricocheted, striking Schnabel in the back of the leg. The wounded Schnabel retreated to the side of the road and took cover in a ditch. The entire firefight lasted about thirty seconds.
Kahl then moved towards Cheshire's vehicle. As Kahl approached, the wounded Kapp decided to flee and began running south, back towards Medina. Kahl chose not to shoot the fleeing officer, and instead turned to the fatally wounded Cheshire, who was trying to climb back inside his vehicle. Seeing that Cheshire was still alive, Kahl killed the dying marshal with two more shots to the head. Gordon Kahl then walked over to Muir and Schnabel's vehicles as Scott Faul tended to the wounded Yorie Von Kahl. Moving to the side of the road, Kahl approached and confronted the wounded Schnabel, but chose not to kill him.[11] After taking Schnabel's shotgun and revolver, Kahl then took Schnabel's police car and, after leaving the wounded Yorie Von Kahl at a Medina health clinic, fled toArkansas. Kahl abandoned the stolen police car just outside of Medina. Yorie Von Kahl was immediately arrested after being treated at the clinic, while Scott Faul turned himself in to police.
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Following the gun battle, Kahl became a wantedfugitive by theFBI, and both local and federal authorities organized a massivemanhunt. Several days after the Medina shootout, aSWAT team surrounded Kahl's farmhouse inHeaton, North Dakota. Unaware that the farmhouse had been abandoned, the SWAT team fired hundreds of shots into the home, killing Kahl's dog, and saturated the house withtear gas. After entering the house, the SWAT team found no sign of Kahl but did discover numerous weapons, ammunition, andwhite supremacist literature printed by thePosse Comitatus.
Kahl was being hidden at the property of Arthur H. Russell just outside ofMountain Home, Arkansas. Those who were harboring Kahl were afraid that the U.S. Marshals were getting close to finding out where Kahl was staying, and decided to move him to the residence of Leonard Ginter and his wife Norma Ginter. Kahl hid in their earth-bermed,passive-solar home inSmithville, Arkansas.
Another shootout on June 3, 1983, ended the lives of Kahl andLawrence County Sheriff Harold Gene Matthews. After FBI agents, U.S. marshals,Arkansas State Police, and local police arrived at the Ginter home, Sheriff Matthews entered the home along with DeputyU.S. Marshal James Hall andArkansas State Police investigator Ed Fitzpatrick. Matthews entered the kitchen and Kahl emerged from behind a refrigerator; the two men fired almost simultaneously. Kahl fired at least one round, which severely wounded Matthews in the heart, and Matthews fired a single.41 Magnum round from his four-inchSmith & Wesson Model 57 revolver, which hit Kahl in the head and instantly killed him. Hall and Fitzpatrick, hearing the gunfire, fired several shotgun blasts inside the house, accidentally striking Matthews in the torso withbuckshot. Matthews managed to get to apolice cruiser before he collapsed, and he gasped his last words, "I got him." After Matthews stumbled out of the house, a SWAT team — unaware that Kahl was dead — began firing thousands of rounds at the house, eventually setting it ablaze by pouringdiesel fuel down the house's chimney. Kahl's burned remains were found the following day.[12] Matthews, critically wounded by the bullet fired from Kahl's Mini-14,[13] was taken to the hospital where he died on anoperating table.[14]
Edwin C. Udey, Arthur H. Russell, Leonard Ginter, and Norma Ginter were all indicted for harboring an concealing a fugitive, and forconspiracy to do the same. They were convicted of all charges. The convictions were upheld on appeal.[15] Leonard was convicted and sentenced to afederal prison, while Norma's sentence was suspended. Leonard was released in February 1987.[16]
Leonard and Norma Ginter were each additionally charged with thecapital murder of Sheriff Gene Matthews in relation to the federal harboring trial in state court.[17] The capital murder charge was later dropped.[18]
For their part in the Medina shootout, Yorie Von Kahl and Scott Faul were both sentenced tolife in prison with eligibility forparole after thirty years.[19] As of June 2024[update], both have been denied parole at each of their parole hearings.[20][21]
David Ronald Broer (1939–2022) was acquitted of assaulting a police officer but was convicted of harboring and concealing a fugitive, with conspiracy to do the same. He was sentenced to ten years in prison and released in 1993.[19]
Joan Kahl was acquitted.[22] Yorie Von Kahl is serving his sentence at theFederal Correctional Institution atPekin, Illinois.[23] Scott Faul is serving his sentence at the Federal Correctional Institution atSandstone, Minnesota.[24]
Gordon Kahl was considered a martyr amongtax protester groups, which helped disseminate his views and radicalize the movement.[25]
Kahl married Joan Miriam Seil in 1945. They had six children.[26] Linda Kahl Holder, Gordon's eldest daughter, was found dead in her car on March 6, 1984, at the age of thirty-six, after committingsuicide with a single self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head.[27]
A 1991 movie which was based on these events was titledIn the Line of Duty: Manhunt in the Dakotas (akaMidnight Murders, and in the Netherlands it was titledIn the Line of Duty: The Twilight Murders), starring actorRod Steiger as Kahl andMichael Gross as the head FBI agent.[28] The events also inspired the making of the documentary filmDeath & Taxes, which was released in 1993.[29]
InDowntown Owl: A Novel, a book byChuck Klosterman which is set in North Dakota in 1983 and 1984, the saga of Gordon Kahl is a constant topic of discussion among the residents of the fictional town of Owl, North Dakota.
In the 21st century, a South Dakota–basedneo-Nazipodcaster whose real name is Riggin Lynn Scheer adopted the name Gordon Kahl online, as a tribute to the original Kahl. Scheer played a key role in promoting a pro-Nazihomeschooling network with thousands of members.[30]
Notes
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) New York FLP News, No. 6, April 1984{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)Bibliography
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