Latest news with #Zajko
Boston Globe
a day ago
- Boston Globe
Leader of cult-like group linked to killing border agent in Vermont faces federal charges
The charge stems from LaSota's arrest in February in Frostburg, Md., after a property owner complained to police that she and two associates had parked a pair box trucks on his land and refused to leave. Police also arrested the two associates, Related : No attorney was listed for LaSota in federal court documents and a date hasn't been set for her first appearance in federal court. LaSota and her followers, known as Zizians, came to prominence in January after the killing of a Advertisement In that incident, authorities allege Teresa Youngblut shot and killed agent David Maland, using a firearm provided to her by Zajko, who had previously lived in Vermont. Border Patrol Agent David Maland was shot and killed in Vermont on Jan. 20. BPA Edward Butron/Associated Press Youngblut is being prosecuted in federal court in Vermont where she is accused of intentionally using a deadly weapon towards federal law enforcement, and using and discharging a firearm during an assault with a deadly weapon. She has pleaded not guilty. Felix Bauckholt, a companion who was driving through Vermont with Youngblut, was killed when another agent fired back during the confrontation. Related : Advertisement The federal indictment against LaSota alleges that she had a black scoped .50 caliber rifle, a black handgun, and more than 450 rounds of ammunition when At the time, LaSota was a fugitive from justice, having skipped court dates in Pennsylvania where she was accused of obstructing investigators looking into the killings of her associate The couple, Richard and Rita Zajko, were fatally shot in their home in Chester Heights, Penn., on New Year's Eve in 2022. No one has been charged in the killing of Zajko's parents, and Zajko has denied she was involved. Related : Prosecutors allege LaSota knew he was a fugitive from justice and therefore couldn't legally possess firearms or ammunition. If convicted, LaSota faces up to 15 years in prison, according to the Maryland United States Attorney's Office. LaSota, Zajko, and Blank also face firearms charges in state court in Maryland, records show. Related : Another Zizian follower, Snyder and Youngblut grew up in Washington state, and applied for a marriage license there last year. Advertisement Laura Crimaldi can be reached at
USA Today
2 days ago
- USA Today
Grand jury indicts accused leader of cultlike 'Zizian' group
A federal grand jury in Maryland has indicted an Alaska person linked to a series of nationwide deaths and violence in Vermont and California via the cultlike "Zizian" group they are accused of inspiring. Prosectors say the grand jury indicted Jack Amadeus LaSota, 34, on charges they possessed a .50-caliber rifle and several handguns while being a fugitive. Court records and interviews with people who know the group say LaSota was the intellectual leader of the largely online movement interested in artificial intelligence. Some of whose members lived full time in box trucks in several states. Lasota has also gone by the names Andrea Phelps, Ann Grimes, Anne Grimes, Canaris, Julia LaSota and "Ziz," prosecutors said. LaSota was assigned male at birth but uses female pronouns; federal and state court records refer to LaSota as a man. "LaSota was knowingly a fugitive from justice and therefore was not permitted by law to possess a firearm or ammunition," the U.S. Attorney's office in Maryland said in a statement. LaSota faces up to a 15-year prison sentence. According to court records and a USA TODAY investigation, the Zizian group is connected to at least six deaths, including the homicide of a U.S. Border Patrol agent in Vermont in January. Court records also indicate LaSota may have faked their own death in 2022. Many of the group members are vegan, and either have degrees in computer science or have studied related fields, according to court records. Some members of the group are transgender, or have rejected binary sexuality, and are interested in the role artificial intelligence may play in creating a new society, according to interviews and court records. In February, Maryland police arrested LaSota along with two other people, Michelle Zajko, 32, and Daniel Blank, 26, in a rural area after the property owner called police to report the black-clad suspects on his land. Blank is a suspect in the late 2022 shooting deaths of Zajko's parents in Pennsylvania, and authorities say LaSota and Zajko are being investigated in connection with other multiple deaths. In January 2023, Zajko was questioned by Pennsylvania State Police about the deaths of her parents, but disappeared with LaSota, leaving behind her car and $40,000 in cash, according to court records. Authorities said Zajko may have also supplied the guns used in the January shootout that ended with the death of Border Patrol agent David Maland and a German national, Ophelia Bauckholt. Arrested in that shooting was Teresa Youngblut, who is jailed and faces charges of using a deadly weapon. Zajko is also facing federal firearms charges. And a man that Youngblut last year got a license to marry, Max Snyder, is jailed in California on charges that he ambushed and fatally stabbed a landlord who had at one time allowed LaSota and other group members to park their trucks on his property. That landlord killed another member of the group in self defense after they attacked him over a planned eviction, according to court records.
Yahoo
16-04-2025
- Yahoo
Member of Zizian group says she did not kill her parents in Pennsylvania home
The Brief The daughter of a Pennsylvania couple whose deaths are among six connected to a cultlike group says she has been falsely accused of killing her parents. Michelle Zajko's denial was part of a 20-page handwritten "Open Letter to the World." No one has been charged in the deaths of Zajko's parents in late 2022. CHESTER HEIGHTS, Pa. - The daughter of a Pennsylvania couple whose deaths are among six connected to a cultlike group says she has been falsely accused of killing her parents. What they're saying Michelle Zajko's denial was part of a 20-page handwritten "Open Letter to the World" her attorney provided to The Associated Press on Tuesday. Dated March 9, the letter also attempts to defend Jack LaSota, also known as Ziz, whom authorities have described as the apparent leader of the "extremist group" called the Zizians. "You, the public, are being lied to," Zajko wrote. "And while I don't promise to answer all your questions, I think the truth about my friends and I will make a lot more sense than what you've been reading about in the papers." The backstory The group has been linked to killings in Vermont, Pennsylvania and California. A cross-country investigation into LaSota and the Zizians broke open in January when one member of the group died and another was arrested after the shooting death of U.S. Border Patrol Agent David Maland in Vermont. Authorities say Zajko provided the gun that was used in the Vermont shooting, and in February, she, LaSota and another associate were arrested in Maryland and charged with trespassing, obstructing law enforcement and illegal gun possession after a man told police that three "suspicious" people parked box trucks on his property and asked to camp there. Zajko also was questioned but not charged in connection with the deaths of her parents, Rita and Richard Zajko, who were shot and killed in their Chester Heights, Pennsylvania, home on New Year's Eve 2022. A few weeks later, LaSota was charged with disorderly conduct after refusing to cooperate with officers investigating the deaths, but Zajko said LaSota was just "in the wrong place at the wrong time." "The police lied to her & told her that I had confessed (to something I didn't do)," she wrote. "My friends and I are being described as like Satan's lapdogs, the devil & the Manson family all rolled into one," she wrote. "These papers are flagrantly lying. For instance, there were no truck-fulls of guns, no machine gun, & I didn't murder my parents." A call and email sent to the Pennsylvania State Police was not immediately answered. Dig deeper Members of the Zizian group also have been tied to the death of one of their own during an attack on a California landlord in November 2022 and the landlord's subsequent killing in January. Maximilian Snyder, who is charged with killing landlord Curtis Lind, had applied for a marriage license with Teresa Youngblut, who is accused of shooting at the Border Patrol agent in Vermont. "The newspapers do not seem to realize that there are multiple groups, & that my friends & I are not with Snyder," she wrote. Youngblut is accused of firing at Maland during a traffic stop and has pleaded not guilty to federal firearms charges. Felix Bauckholt, a passenger in the car, also was killed in a shootout. Bauckholt and LaSota were living together in North Carolina as recently as this winter, according to their landlord, who also was renting a duplex to Youngblut in the same neighborhood. Zajko's lawyer said Tuesday that Zajko also had been living in North Carolina before the group moved north to Frostburg, Maryland. The Source Information from this article was provided by the Associated Press.
NBC News
16-04-2025
- NBC News
Member of Zizians, cultlike group of AI-obsessed vegans, says she didn't kill her parents
CONCORD, N.H. — The daughter of a Pennsylvania couple whose deaths are among six connected to a cultlike group says she has been falsely accused of killing her parents. Michelle Zajko's denial was part of a 20-page handwritten 'Open Letter to the World' her attorney provided to The Associated Press on Tuesday. Dated March 9, the letter also attempts to defend Jack LaSota, also known as Ziz, whom authorities have described as the apparent leader of the 'extremist group' called the Zizians. 'You, the public, are being lied to,' Zajko wrote. 'And while I don't promise to answer all your questions, I think the truth about my friends and I will make a lot more sense than what you've been reading about in the papers.' The group has been linked to killings in Vermont, Pennsylvania and California. A cross-country investigation into LaSota and the Zizians broke open in January when one member of the group died and another was arrested after the shooting death of U.S. Border Patrol Agent David Maland in Vermont. Authorities say Zajko provided the gun that was used in the Vermont shooting, and in February, she, LaSota and another associate were arrested in Maryland and charged with trespassing, obstructing law enforcement and illegal gun possession after a man told police that three 'suspicious' people parked box trucks on his property and asked to camp there. Zajko also was questioned but not charged in connection with the deaths of her parents, Rita and Richard Zajko, who were shot and killed in their Chester Heights, Pennsylvania, home on New Year's Eve 2022. A few weeks later, LaSota was charged with disorderly conduct after refusing to cooperate with officers investigating the deaths, but Zajko said LaSota was just 'in the wrong place at the wrong time.' 'The police lied to her & told her that I had confessed (to something I didn't do),' she wrote. 'My friends and I are being described as like Satan's lapdogs, the devil & the Manson family all rolled into one,' she wrote. 'These papers are flagrantly lying. For instance, there were no truck-fulls of guns, no machine gun, & I didn't murder my parents.' A call and email sent to the Pennsylvania State Police was not immediately answered. Members of the Zizian group also have been tied to the death of one of their own during an attack on a California landlord in November 2022 and the landlord's subsequent killing in January. Maximilian Snyder, who is charged with killing landlord Curtis Lind, had applied for a marriage license with Teresa Youngblut, who is accused of shooting at the Border Patrol agent in Vermont. 'The newspapers do not seem to realize that there are multiple groups, & that my friends & I are not with Snyder,' she wrote. Youngblut is accused of firing at Maland during a traffic stop and has pleaded not guilty to federal firearms charges. Felix Bauckholt, a passenger in the car, also was killed in a shootout. Bauckholt and LaSota were living together in North Carolina as recently as this winter, according to their landlord, who also was renting a duplex to Youngblut in the same neighborhood. Zajko's lawyer said Tuesday that Zajko also had been living in North Carolina before the group moved north to Frostburg, Maryland.
Boston Globe
16-04-2025
- Boston Globe
Member of Zizian group says she did not kill her parents
The group has been linked to killings in Vermont, Pennsylvania and California. A cross-country investigation into LaSota and the Zizians broke open in January when one member of the group died and another was arrested after the shooting death of U.S. Border Patrol Agent David Maland in Vermont. Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up Authorities say Zajko provided the gun that was used in the Vermont shooting, and in February, she, LaSota and another associate were arrested in Maryland and charged with trespassing, obstructing law enforcement and illegal gun possession after a man told police that three 'suspicious' people parked box trucks on his property and asked to camp there. Advertisement She also was questioned but not charged in connection with the deaths of her parents, Rita and Richard Zajko, who were shot and killed in their Chester Heights, Pennsylvania, home on New Year's Eve 2022. A few weeks later, LaSota was charged with disorderly conduct after refusing to cooperate with officers investigating the deaths, but Zajko said LaSota was just 'in the wrong place at the wrong time.' Advertisement 'The police lied to her & told her that I had confessed (to something I didn't do),' she wrote. 'My friends and I are being described as like Satan's lapdogs, the devil & the Manson family all rolled into one,' she wrote. 'These papers are flagrantly lying. For instance, there were no truck-fulls of guns, no machine gun, & I didn't murder my parents.' Members of the Zizian group also have been tied to the death of one of their own during an attack on a California landlord in November 2022 and the landlord's subsequent killing in January. Maximilian Snyder, who is charged with killing landlord Curtis Lind, had applied for a marriage license with Teresa Youngblut, who is accused of shooting at the Border Patrol agent in Vermont. But Zajko said Youngblut had fled from Snyder in November. 'The newspapers do not seem to realize that there are multiple groups, & that my friends & I are not with Snyder,' she wrote. Youngblut is accused of firing at Maland during a traffic stop and has pleaded not guilty to federal firearms charges. Felix Bauckholt, a passenger in the car, also was killed in a shootout. Bauckholt and LaSota were living together in North Carolina as recently as this winter, according to their landlord, who also was renting a duplex to Youngblut in the same neighborhood. Zajko's lawyer said Tuesday that Zajko also had been living in North Carolina before the group moved north to Frostburg, Maryland. Advertisement 'The news media has utterly terrified this small town into thinking we were here to hurt them,' wrote Zajko, who said their only plans were 'eating (vegan) soft pretzels with guacamole, repairing a diesel heater, & camping.' Zajko also alleges that LaSota and others were victims of a smear campaign led by people associated with rationalism, a movement that seeks to understand human cognition and address the potential dangers of artificial intelligence. 'Stalkers and abusers' within the community have tried to discredit Zizians for trying to expose sexual abuse within rationalist organizations, she said. She described LaSota as an extraordinary friend who rescued her from an abusive relationship. 'Ziz is not my leader, and I am not her's. What we have is called friendship, and I love her infinitely more than I could ever express,' she wrote. 'She doesn't deserve her bad reputation. She deserves to be free.'
