It’s becoming clear that the “Boogaloo Bois” who have been filling Facebook and other social media platforms with their increasingly violent scenarios about engaging in a civil war—beginning with civil authorities as the chief targets, expanding to include racial and ethnic minorities, and finally including their ordinary neighbors—are not content to merely keep fantasies online.
A 32-year-old Air Force sergeant with special combat training tried to make the “Boogaloo” a reality this week in Santa Cruz, California, when he embarked on a killing rampage targeting law enforcement officers, ambushing two sheriff’s deputies, killing one, and severely wounding another. He then was stopped by a determined neighbor before he could get any farther. On the hood of his car, he had scrawled in blood: “I became unreasonable” and “Boog.”
It shortly emerged that Steven Carrillo is also the primary suspect in the shootings of two federal protective services officers (one of whom died) last month in Oakland during street protests over the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. There has been previous evidence that so-called “Boogaloo” fans have been involved in some of the violence at the anti-police brutality protests around the nation. Continue reading.