The FBI quietly arrested a person residing in Pomona late final month after he apparently tried to promote gun attachments to an area group of anti-government extremists to make their firearms extra lethal and simpler to hide, in line with court docket paperwork.
Matthew Edward Chen was arrested on Jan. 28, a couple of week after he offered three auto sears — gadgets that may be hooked up to a firearm to make it absolutely computerized — to a purported member of the “Cali Bois,” a California-based group that subscribes to an ideology referred to as “Boogaloo,” a web based motion that desires to deliver down the U.S. authorities by encouraging civil struggle by means of violent acts.
In court docket filings, officers mentioned Chen organized a meet-up with who he believed was a Cali Bois member at a park in Pomona on Jan. 20, the place he offered the member the auto sears. What he didn’t know was that the customer was an undercover FBI agent. Chen then invited the spy to his Pomona condo, the place he allegedly confirmed the agent extra weapons, silencers, and movies of himself firing weapons within the desert.
“Chen then returned to the kitchen with a rifle slung round his neck and carrying a Glock semi-automatic handgun. The handgun had a detachable inventory. The rifle had a detachable silencer,” an FBI agent wrote in a legal grievance filed Jan. 27.
“Chen supplied the (spy) with directions concerning methods to set up an auto sear on the Glock handgun, and demonstrated how…the handgun would function as a completely computerized firearm.”
The arrest of Chen — who in line with the grievance was himself a member of the Cali Bois who glided by the identify “Dolphin” in on-line chats — on a cost of possession of an unregistered firearm, seemed to be half of a bigger federal legislation enforcement effort to disrupt teams of Boogaloo adherents who've impressed violent assaults on authorities employees and buildings in recent times.
The time period “Boogaloo” because it’s used on-line right this moment emerged round 2013 from teams of web customers espousing violence within the identify of defending sure Constitutional rights, most notably gun possession, in among the most excessive imageboards of internet sites like 4chan and Fb. A few of these customers particularly inspired others to organize for a second U.S. Civil Struggle.
Most just lately in line with the FBI, through the COVID-19 pandemic, “militia violent extremists have made requires the ‘Boogaloo,’ ‘massive igloo,’ or ‘massive luau,’ and used imagery similar to igloos or Hawaiian shirts to advertise their curiosity or anticipation of an impending struggle.”
Within the grievance, the FBI famous different assaults it believed had been impressed by the Boogaloo motion: A 2019 capturing on the Earl Cabell Federal Constructing in Dallas, by which solely the attacker was killed; and two 2020 shootings in Northern California, by which Steven Carrillo, an active-duty U.S. Air Drive servicemember, was charged with killing a safety guard exterior a federal constructing in Oakland and a Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Division deputy.
In accordance with the Program on Extremism at George Washington College, which posted the legal grievance in opposition to Chen, a minimum of six Boogaloo members have been arrested in California since 2021, together with two who later pleaded responsible to trying to assist Carrillo keep away from arrest by federal brokers. Across the nation, a minimum of 44 individuals espousing Boogaloo ideology have been arrested within the final two years, in line with this system.
For months, a minimum of, the FBI had been monitoring the Cali Bois and infiltrating the group in Southern California, in line with the grievance.
The spy and an FBI informant attended a gathering with Chen and different Cali Bois members on Oct. 23, 2021, within the Murrieta storage of a member referred to as “Unicorn,” and known as “A.B.” in court docket paperwork.
At that assembly, Chen gave a PowerPoint presentation explaining how the members may skirt federal legal guidelines governing the constructing of firearm silencers at residence, with one slide entitled “Every little thing You’re Not Presupposed to Know About Suppressors.”
Chen offered a minimum of one silencer to the spy on the assembly for $400, in line with the grievance.
He has not been indicted. Chen is anticipated to return to court docket in Downtown Los Angeles for a preliminary listening to on Friday.
Chen was launched on Feb. 1, after household mates posted $120,000 bond. He was additionally ordered to give up his passports and weapons, and to have his location tracked by U.S. Marshals by means of an ankle monitor. He was ordered to not go away the Central District of California.
Courtroom paperwork confirmed Chen was residing in a short-term rental in Pomona obtained by his father. An FBI agent described Chen as a flight threat as a result of he has twin citizenship and has “proof of psychological issues.” The court docket ordered Chen to be evaluated by psychological well being clinicians.
It’s not clear from court docket paperwork the place Chen was residing earlier than relocating to Pomona, or how lengthy he’d been residing there.
Federal officers had been unable to say Tuesday whether or not there had been every other arrests of Cali Bois members apart from Chen. Within the grievance, the FBI mentioned the Cali Bois Boogaloo group “maintains energetic chapters in, amongst different locations, the higher Los Angeles space, the higher San Francisco and Sacramento space, and the higher San Diego space.”
Courtroom paperwork didn't have extra details about every other actions by the group or how the FBI discovered it within the first place.
A federal public defender assigned to Chen didn't return a request for remark Tuesday.