Ruby Ridge standoff
1992 standoff in Boundary County, Idaho, United States, that resulted in three human fatalities
The Ruby Ridge standoff was the siege of the Weaver family home in Boundary County, Idaho, in August 1992. On August 21, deputies of the United States Marshals Service (USMS) came to arrest Randy Weaver under a bench warrant for his failure to appear on federal firearms charges. The charges stemmed from Weaver's sale of a sawed-off shotgun to an undercover federal informant.
During a pre-arrest surveillance operation, U.S. Marshal Art Roderick shot Weaver's dog when it ran at them and then pointed his rifle at Weaver's 14-year-old son, Samuel, who was armed. Samuel fired at the marshals, and was shot in the back and killed by the team. In the ensuing exchange of fire, Weaver's friend Kevin Harris shot and killed Deputy Marshal William Francis Degan Jr. Subsequently, Weaver, Harris and members of Weaver's immediate family refused to surrender. The Hostage Rescue Team of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI HRT) became involved as the siege was mounted. In the standoff, FBI sniper Lon Horiuchi shot Weaver, then shot Harris, but the second shot also hit and killed Weaver's wife Vicki blindly through a doorway. The conflict was ultimately resolved by civilian negotiators, including veteran activist Bo Gritz, who eventually convinced them to surrender.
“Ruby Ridge standoff” enters the record as 1992 standoff in Boundary County, Idaho, United States, that resulted in three human fatalities. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Ruby, Ridge and standoff can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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This entry incorporates text from “Ruby Ridge standoff” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.