Another man convicted in a plot to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer was sentenced to prison. Barry Croft, 47, of Bear, De., got a term of nearly 20 years on Wednesday. He was described by federal prosecutors as the ideas man in the foiled 2020 plan to kidnap Whitmer, a Democrat. The scheme was stopped by the FBI before the men could harm the governor. The plotter group was saturated with informants, and defense attorneys claimed the men were encouraged and entrapped, reports the Wall Street Journal. The man described as the ringleader of the scheme, Adam Fox, was sentenced Tuesday to 16 years. Prosecutors described Croft as the scheme’s spiritual leader, a man who infused religion into the plot and gave co-conspirators a seeming dispensation to kill people if necessary. Prosecutors compared his role to a sheik’s role in al-Qaeda. “This whole thing was Mr. Croft’s idea,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Nils Kessler said in a Grand Rapids, Mi., court. “What he wanted was a second Civil War or a revolution.” According to the prosecution, Croft and Fox were central to a scheme to kidnap Whitmer at her vacation home and use a bomb to blow up a bridge near the residence. On two occasions, they reconnoitered the house and stockpiled weapons and gear needed to carry out the plan. At an early training exercise the men held as part of the scheme, Croft made an improvised explosive device but it was poorly constructed and the men couldn’t detonate its. At a later event, successfully detonated it against human-shaped targets. In a photo obtained by prosecutors, Croft wears a tricorn hat and carries a Boogaloo flag, a symbol of desire for civil war. He has tattoos with extremist slogans and symbols. Judge Robert Jonker said the scheme had little chance of being carried out but only because law enforcement acted early to infiltrate the group and stop the men before they could take action.
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