Dash cam surveillance video played in court

BELLAIRE — Headlight beams from a pickup truck illuminate wet black pavement, and the rhythmic sounds of rain and windshield wipers, recorded by a dashcam, filled the courtroom on day two of a trial for three men facing state charges related to a plot to kidnap Michigan’s governor.

Prosecutors said the dashcam video was recorded by a Wisconsin man, Brian Higgins, during a Sept. 11, 2020, surveillance of Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s lakeside summer home, located a few miles north of Elk Rapids.

“This is what we’re calling the ‘signal car,’” FBI Agent Henrik Impola, a state prosecution witness, testified Thursday, about Higgins’ vehicle. “There was also a ‘spotter car’ and a ‘lookout car.’”

State prosecutors have charged Eric Molitor and brothers Michael Null and William Null, with one count of providing material support for an act of terrorism and one count of possession of a firearm while in commission of a felony.

The men have pleaded not guilty.

Higgins and another man, Shawn Fix, were previously charged in the case, and both have since accepted plea agreements with prosecutors in exchange for their testimony, though neither man is on the state’s witness list.

The prosecution is in the midst of presenting its case against the men, and on Thursday lead prosecutor, Assistant Attorney General William Rollstin, questioned Impola about two reported trips — a so-called “daytime surveillance” on Aug. 29, 2020 and a “nighttime surveillance” on Sept. 12, 2020 — that one or more of the defendants made from downstate to the Elk Rapids area.

Higgins’ video, about two minutes of which was entered into evidence as prosecution exhibit No. 202, was recorded during the nighttime surveillance. Impola said the signal car, which was actually Higgins’ truck, made two passes, down and back, on the road where Whitmer owns a home.

“That’s gotta be it,” a man’s voice says, on the recording, as mailboxes, one after the other, come into view, then pass into the dark.

“How much longer are we on this road?” another man asks.

“They said it’s near the end,” the first man says.

Higgins was driving the so-called “signal vehicle,” Impola said, and he and his passengers were tasked with signaling to others, by flashing their headlights, when they passed Whitmer’s home. With Higgins were two men, Ty Garbin and Kaleb Franks, who later pleaded guilty in federal court for their role in the kidnapping plot.

A confidential source referred to only as “CHS Dan” drove the “spotter car,” tasked with parking at a boat launch across the lake from Whitmer’s home and watching for the headlights of the signal car. With CHS Dan were Adam Fox, Barry Croft, Steve Robeson and an FBI agent referred to only as “Undercover Red.”

Another FBI agent, a man referred to as “Undercover Mark,” drove the lookout car, his passengers were the Null brothers, and they were tasked with keeping an eye out for law enforcement, Impola said.

During testimony late Thursday morning, Impola, in dramatic fashion, explained how CHS Dan wore a special watch and one of the undercover agents had a transmitter, allowing Impola to monitor their activity, even if Fox or others required everyone to turn off their phones or leave them behind.

“Undercover Red is wearing a transmitter, so I’m live-monitoring the traffic on those live devices,” Impola said. “I was able to hear Mr. Fox say he saw the signal car through the night vision.”

Impola, under questioning Wednesday and Thursday from Rollstin, identified for the jury the other men involved in the two trips north.

CHS Dan was an FBI source, who Impola said the government paid about $54,000 — $24,000 for reimbursed expenses and $30,000 for lost wages — though Dan had not asked for the funds.

“We were asking a lot from him,” Impola said. “And I was worried he wouldn’t be able to continue if he didn’t pay his bills.”

Adam Fox, who identified himself as Michigan’s leader of an anti-government group called “the Second Continental Congress,” and who prosecutors describe as the plot’s ringleader, is currently incarcerated in a maximum-security prison in Colorado, following his conviction by a jury on federal conspiracy charges.

Barry Croft, of Delaware, was a truck driver also later convicted by a jury in federal court, after prosecutors said he was Fox’s co-leader, and with Fox explored the idea of blowing up the Elk River bridge as a way to slow a law enforcement response to Whitmer’s home.

Fox was sentenced to 16 years in prison and Croft was sentenced to 19 years in prison, court records show.

Robeson, who like Higgins is from Wisconsin, was at one time a confidential informant for the government, until he ran afoul of the law for illegally purchasing a firearm, court records show, and was later labeled a “double agent” by prosecutors in previous trials.

“Undercover Red” is an FBI agent the government brought into the investigation to pose as an explosives expert, over concerns Fox was pursuing access to explosives in order to blow up the US-31 bridge over the Elk River.

The spotter car, Impola said, pulled off US-31, Fox got out of the car and used a boardwalk to walk under the bridge and take photographs.

Impola returned to the witness stand Thursday afternoon, where under questioning from Rollstin he explored, for the jury, messaging evidence from social media and encrypted communication aps some or all the defendants are accused of using, such as Signal and Wire.

Michael Null’s attorney, Thomas Siver, has a standing objection, filed prior to the beginning of the trial, to all of the state’s exhibits, be they videos, audios, transcripts of social media chats or encrypted text messages.

William Barnett, who represents Eric Molitor, and Damian Nunzio, who with his daughter Kristyna Nunzio, represents William Null, each offered objections to some exhibits as having no relevance to their clients.

“I suggest the threat streams are coming together,” Rollstin said, of why testimony and exhibits about the Wolverine Watchmen, a militia group that none of the defendants belonged to, was valid evidence.

The jury, and not a witness, should determine how to interpret evidence, Nunzio said.

Nunzio told 13th Circuit Court Judge Charles Hamlyn, that Impola was testifying as an expert in domestic terrorism, which he was not qualified to do, and editorializing evidence by calling certain memes offered by the prosecution, “propaganda.”

Nunzio also objected to a photograph of Croft, showing off a tattoo on his forearm, which read “Expect Us,” as something nefarious.

“A soccer mom could be saying ‘expect us,” Nunzio said.

The judge ultimately allowed the prosecutor to continue, on all these points, though later said he would not allow a few exhibits because the prosecution provided them to the defense after the Aug. 7 deadline.

Rollstin ended the day with a Facebook live video of Croft, wearing his signature three-point black hat, which Impola said harkened back to Revolutionary War soldiers fighting the British, imploring his followers to fight against a tyrannical government.

“In that video clip, he’s talking about dying for his children, is that correct?” Rollstin asked Impola.

“Yes,” Impola said.

“You hear anything like that similar, from any of the defendants here in court today?”

“Eric Molitor said in a Facebook chat . . . that he was willing to die in battle for his kids,” Impola said. “Bill Null, later in a COVID chat, said that we’re at war and we need to fight for our children.”

The judge adjourned the trial about 5 p.m. and is expected to continue Friday, beginning at 9 a.m.

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