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On June 12, 2011, David Burgert — a convicted felon and militia leader who hatched a plan to overthrow state and local government a decade earlier — led police on a chase through the forests of western Montana. In a wooded area in the Lolo National Forest, David drove up a hill, got out of his truck and shot at two sheriff's deputies before disappearing into the wilderness. No one has seen him since. From the newsroom of the Flathead Beacon comes a new podcast about one of Montana's biggest ...
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Michael Jamison was the Flathead Valley bureau chief for the Missoulian newspaper in the late 1990s and early 2000s, giving him an up-close look at David Burgert and Project 7 as the story unfolded. In this episode, you'll hear Michael explain when authorities started to take David seriously, how he became part of a raging battle over logging and c…
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Show hosts Andy Viano and Justin Franz sat down on the ninth anniversary of David Burgert's disappearance to talk about the series they spent more than 18 months putting together. Flathead Beacon Editor-in-Chief Kellyn Brown guides the conversation, which covers Justin and Andy's theories about what happened back in 2011, what they learned from mak…
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Nine years ago, David Earl Burgert Jr., a former militia leader and convicted felon, disappeared in the mountains of Montana. No one has seen him since. In the years since that day in June 2011, Burgert's legend has grown and the hunt for answers has continued, but so far, it has only turned up more questions. In the final episode of Project 7, Fla…
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For more than a year, David Burgert had been stockpiling weapons and making a list of public officials he wanted to assassinate in an apparent attempt to overthrow the government. But it all came crashing down in February 2002, when a close friend of David went to the FBI and told them about his plans. After an all-night standoff with police, David…
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Project 7, the six-part mini-series from the Flathead Beacon, will return with Episode 5 on May 13. Until then, here are a pair of segments from bonus episodes of the show that are released each week for members of the Flathead Beacon Editor's Club. Bonus episodes include in-depth conversations with the show's hosts, interview clips that could not …
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Throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, anti-government extremists were among federal law enforcement’s top concerns before everything changed on Sept. 11, 2001. Yet regardless of what law enforcement was focusing on after the terror attacks, there was a growing threat in Kalispell as David Burgert stockpiled weapons and turned a fledgling militia in…
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For much of 2001, a conflict was brewing between David Burgert and law enforcement in the Flathead Valley. Early in the year, David got into a physical confrontation with some cops at his home in Kalispell. Later, in November, the local search and rescue team refused his assistance when a young boy was lost in an area David was familiar with; the b…
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After a brief stint in prison for breaking into a trailer and stealing a sandwich, David Burgert arrives in the sleepy town of Kalispell, Montana in 1989 looking to start a new life. But David struggles to leave the ghosts of his past behind and quickly spirals out of control. After hitting rock-bottom, David finds solace and companionship in a loc…
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Larry Schwindt was a rookie deputy with the Missoula County Sheriff’s Office on June 12, 2011, when he and his partner got a call about a man illegally camping at a place called Fort Fizzle. Little did Schwindt know the call would change his life forever. A few minutes later, Schwindt was being led deep in the Lolo National Forest by a man named Da…
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On June 12, 2011, David Burgert — a convicted felon and militia leader who hatched a plan to overthrow state and local government a decade earlier — led police on a chase through the forests of western Montana. In a wooded area in the Lolo National Forest, David drove up a hill, got out of his truck and shot at two sheriff's deputies before disappe…
…
continue reading
