Official: Arivaca shooting suspect confessed

A man indicted in a double murder in Arivaca confessed the day he was arrested and implicated his co-defendants and others, but he was not offered a plea deal, according to court records and a Pima County Sheriff’s investigator.

FORDE PLANNED TO GO TO SYRIA, MOTHER SAYS: http://www.heraldnet.com/article/20090708/NEWS01/907089972&news01ad=1#Shawna.Forde.planned.to.go.to.Syria.after.killings.mom.says

Jason Eugene “Gunny” Bush, 34, admitted to the May 30 murders of Raul Flores Jr. and his 9-year-old daughter Brisenia in an audiotaped interview shortly after he was arrested in Kingman on June 11, Lt. Michael O’Connor said Tuesday.

“It was quite a lengthy interview with him,” O’Connor said. “He admitted to both murders.”

Paperwork filed by the Pima County Attorney’s Office on June 16 indicates Bush, whose last knows address was in Meadview, Ariz., “has confessed locally to two murders, one of a 9-year-old child.” But O’Connor said Bush wasn’t offered a plea deal in exchange for his full confession, but rather offered it willingly and had been read his Miranda rights.

“He murdered a little girl,” O’Connor said. “I think that was hard on him.”

Along with his confession, O’Connor said Bush implicated Shawna Forde, 41, originally from Washington state but who was living in Tucson, and Albert Robert Gaxiola, 42, of Arivaca, as his accomplices. Nevertheless, Bush, Forde and Gaxiola entered pleas of not guilty at their arraignment June 30.

The three are each charged with eight felony counts, including first-degree murder, burglary in the first degree, aggravated assault and armed robbery.

Bush is being held on a $5 million bond and Forde and Gaxiola are each being held on a $1 million bond.

The public defender assigned to Bush declined to comment on the case. Forde and Gaxiola’s lawyers couldn’t be reached.

Bush named several other people in the murders but O’Connor said he couldn’t reveal how many, their names or how they are related to the suspects for fear of compromising the investigation. No other arrests have been made.

“We’re still evaluating their culpability in this and we’re waiting for more evidence to come,” he said.

According to the Sheriff’s Office, Flores, who was a known drug dealer, and his daughter were shot in the head after several people dressed in camouflage and military gear posed as law enforcement officers and invaded their home. Flores’ wife was shot three times, but managed to fend off the intruders by firing back at them with a handgun and wounding one, now identified as Bush by officials. Bush was treated in a Kingman hospital after his arrest for a gunshot wound to the leg.

In the 911 call the night of the murders, Flores’ wife said she only saw three intruders but thought there could have been as many as five.

Her description of a female suspect given to investigators the day after the murders matched Forde’s physical characteristics, according to Pima County Sheriff’s Office documents, and she also told officers she saw a Caucasian male over six-feet, four-inches tall and about 300 pounds. Bush is six-feet, five-inches tall and weighs 225 pounds, according to court records.

Flores’ wife also told officers that a third man at the scene May 30 matched the description of Gaxiola, who she knew from around town and had a previous dispute with her husband over drugs.

According to Pima County Attorney records, Forde and Gaxiola “are believed to be the ones who picked the house, initiated the crime and directed the shooting.”

Forde, the leader of Minutemen American Defense, a border protection group in which Bush was a high-ranking member, hatched the plot to rob and kill drug dealers and steal their money to fund the group’s border operations, officials said.

Bush has a history of mental illness, according to Chelan County (Wash.) court papers, in which he claimed he’d been treated for bipolar disorder and schizophrenia since the mid-1980s. During a January 1998 stolen property case, Bush argued that his ill health would obstruct his ability to assist in his own defense.

“For most of my life since the age of 11 or 12, I have had an experience of being outside myself, of watching another person take over my body,” Bush said in the court declaration. “I start going haywire and I don’t know what I’m doing or why. It’s like being in a daze. I don’t know why it happens and it scares me. It’s like someone else crawls under my skin. It is very frustrating.”

Pima County court records also show that Bush has a history of mental illness and drug use.

The Everett (Wash.) Herald newspaper reported that Bush told members of the Minutemen group that he was a decorated Special Forces veteran who’d survived combat in Somalia, Bosnia, Afghanistan and Iraq. But Pentagon officials say there is no record that Bush served in the military, the newspaper reported.

Bush has military tattoos, including “special forces” and “recon-viper, 7th artillery group La Grande, OR” according to a warrant issued by the Pima County Justice Court. He also has “white power” and “aryan brother” tattoos, according to the warrant.

Wenatchee, Wash., police said they’ve found Bush has “long-standing” connections to white supremacists, including people associated with the Aryan Nation, the Herald reported.

Court records show that Bush served prison time in Idaho, Kansas and Washington, including nearly five years for several charges, including auto theft and being a felon in possession of a firearm.

He’s also been charged in the 1997 murder of a man in Wenatchee, Wash, according to court papers, and the state prosecuting attorney is seeking extradition for that crime and other theft charges.

He’s also a suspect, along with Forde, in the Redding, Calif., robbery of Forde’s half-brother, the Herald has reported.