10. America Didn't Send Its Best

When the FBI closes its net, several activists are arrested. And Zebb enters a criminal justice system that’s stacked against him. But has the FBI ignored a much bigger, much more real threat to America? And finally, Trevor tracks down the man in the silver hearse. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
It's July twenty twenty one, and zeb Hal is going
to work. Get out of my car, you know, working
a nail net for a contract thirty bucks an Arrow'm
fucking happy. It's been nearly a year since he's seen
Mickey Windecker or really anyone involved in the protest scene.
And walk back to my car because I forgot something

(00:22):
came back out. Then I saw those letters as he's
walking back to his car. Zepsi's a man wearing a
blue jacket with three large yellow letters on the back.
He said, zebadiyas Hall. I was like, yeah, FBI. It
was hard for me to hear anything else after that.
And I'll just put my hands up in the air
because I'm thinking these dudes are gonna just fucking straight

(00:44):
up shoot me. I'm freaking out and shaking everything in
my I'm like, fuck, you know, I'm you know, I'm no,
I'm getting arrested. FBI agents search zeb and his car,
they take his belt and his shoes. Then they take
me to like this holding sale and I'm freaking walk out.
Zeb has just one question, was it Mickey. I'm Trevor

(01:09):
Aaronson from Western Sound and I heeart podcasts This is
Alphabet Boys, Episode ten, America didn't send its best. Among

(01:44):
the racial justice demonstrators in Denver, Trey Quinn is the
only one who was really onto Mickey. I think he's
I think he's fucking suspicious. Trey had proposed a hypothetical
idea to Mickey back in August twenty twenty, what if
a neighborhood were set on fire, and Mickey told Tray
that he knew some guys who could make that happen.

(02:06):
Trey was smart enough to suspect that that's the behavior
of a FED, but Trey never has definitive proof until
the next month when he's arrested. I had the day off,
and when I went back to work the next day,
one of my courses like, Hey, yeah, the cops came
here looking for you and you weren't here. And I

(02:26):
was like, and I was like, oh shit, here we go,
Here we go. At the time, Tray's working out a
Sherwyn Williams. From inside through the windows, he sees a
police cruiser pull up right behind his car in the
parking lot, and I see two cops walking through the doors,

(02:48):
and then two more walk through the doors, and then
one more walks through the door and stands out the door,
and they come up and they like to trade Quinn,
you got one for your risk for insighting Ray and
so on and so forth. And so I was like
no protests, saying I lead no protests, which was true
at this time. What Tree means is that as the
protests had become more violent with the attacks on the

(03:10):
police stations, he had backed away. So Trey wasn't technically
leading the protest any longer. And so then they cuffed me.
We get outside and there's a Shillottle cop cars out
there and tossed me in and whipped me away, just
voiced me away. He and five other organizers are arrested

(03:30):
that day for activities during the demonstrations. In twenty twenty,
Trays charged with inciting a riot, engaging in a riot,
false imprisonment, and obstructing government operations. When I was being
detained and questioned, they passed me off to the FITS.
Trey is taken into an interrogation room. And so when

(03:50):
the FETs came in the room and introduced themselves to me,
Mickey was the first name that they dropped for Trey.
Hearing the FETs mentioned Mickey from the very beginning. He
knew what that meant. They were trying to gauge his suspicion.
I mean, why else would you do that? And so

(04:11):
I said, what do you know about Mickey? And they said, well,
we're trying to figure that out. And that's obviously a
tell right there. And so I knew right then and
there he's working with these guys. Prosecutors, after deliberating for
nine months, eventually dropped all the charges against Trey. The
five other protest organizers who are arrested also have their

(04:33):
charges thrown out. Their cases were bogus, but the damage
to the movement is done. Mickey's operation in Denver is
coming to a close as the FEDS, with the help
of local officials, start hauling in some of the people
he's been secretly recording. Well, they showed up at my house,
they showed up at the park that I was at

(04:55):
with my girlfriend and her daughter, and they showed up
at my best friend in's house. This is Bryce Shelby,
the guy who discussed with Mickey and the FBI undercover
agent a plan to assassinate Colorade as attorney general or
was it the district attorney A vague plot that ultimately
went nowhere. They said I was under investigation for pretty

(05:17):
much saying that was gonna murder the attorney general. This
was on November third, twenty twenty, the same day of
the presidential election. The cops seemed on edge, so they
patted me down and shit like that. And it was
really light first off, Like for your listeners, I'm not
trying to be amusement and poke fun and no ship

(05:38):
like that. But it was almost like they were still
scared in whatever way. It was like they were still afraid,
Like this motherfucker, he's still got something still, you know
what I mean. It was weird. They take Bryce's assault
rifle from his home, but they don't arrest him. Bryce
isn't being charged with a crime. Instead, local prosecutors use

(06:01):
the evidence the FBI collected to ask a court to
take away Bryce's gun for a year. Under Colorado's so
called red flag law, Bryce is a potential threat to
the community, prosecutors argue. Local media run with a story.
His name is Bryce Jordan Shelby and this is his
mug shot from twenty eleven. Law enforcement officials present Bryce's

(06:24):
case as if the assassination plot was something a lot
more than it was. This is from the local Fox
affiliate KDVR, as accuses Bryce Jordan Sidney Shelby I'm surveilling
Attorney General phil Wiser's Hall. The twenty nine year old
is now accused of plotting to shoot Attorney General Phil
Wiser in the head, Planning to shoot the state's top
law enforcement official in the head and quote does not

(06:46):
care if a g Wiser's wife, dog, or children have
to die in the process, and adhering to take away
Bryce's firearms. A Denver police detective testifies that the FBI
had reached what he called an impasse and had not
been able to build a prosecutable criminal case against Bryce.
Probably gets a little blurred because I did say certain things.

(07:09):
So that's whatever they're in some way to put it
for intent and shit like that, you know what I mean.
But yeah, not going through with any kind of plant
payments and shit like that. Yeah, no, you know, I
mean no, zeb Hall isn't as fortunate. After buying a

(07:30):
gun for Mickey and being there that strange night when
Mickey recorded the video making threats and saying he wasn't
a snitch, zeb backed away from all of it, and everyone,
including Mickey, things had gone too far, had become too dangerous.

(07:50):
The revolution that can wait, police say. Shelby, who self
identifies with the Black Panther Party, also said he wanted
to I woul eliminate the mayors and police chiefs of
Denver and Aurora. Zeb see's on the news that police
have taken away Bryce Shelby's guns. Zeb's been very slow
to come around to this conclusion, but by now he's

(08:12):
finally beginning to suspect that Mickey's an informant. So and
this is kind of bizarre given that suspicion. But Zeb
sends a link to a local news article about Bryce
to Mickey, and you know, that was when I text
Mickey out of nowhere, gonna say that, you know, I
guess fuck around, I'll find it out. And he says yep,

(08:32):
and kept it at that. That was in November twenty
twenty months pass and in July twenty twenty one, out
of nowhere, Zeb gets another text from Mickey. According to
an FBI internal report, agents asked Mickey to reach out
to Zeb an anticipation of securing an indictment against him

(08:53):
and to determine his whereabouts, checking to see how you're doing, Mickey, writes.
Zeb text Mickey that he's surprised to hear from him.
He also says he's distanced himself from everyone who's participated
in the demonstrations. I think you're paranoid, lol. Mickey replies,
nothing against you and your crew, but the past year

(09:14):
was dangerous, Zeb writes. At this point, Zeb is scared
of Mickey. Is he a snitch as people have claimed,
or is he just some crazy, badass motherfucker? What if
he comes looking for me? Zeb thinks I even bought
a gun because I was just afraid of him. I

(09:35):
was fucking terrified of this guy. Always kept it up
in my closet and everything. You know. I took it
out with me a few times just because I was
fucking afraid, kept it in my car. I don't know
if that's legal or not, but I was just fucking
terrified this human being. About two weeks after that out
of the blue text exchange with Mickey, Zeb's at work
and walks back out to his car. He sees a

(09:56):
bunch of guys wearing FBI jackets. They're waiting for with
a federal indictment. Zeb's been charged with transferring a firearm
to a felon, an offense punishable by up to ten
years in prison and a fine of up to two
hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Zeb is about to enter
a criminal justice system that's rigged against him more after

(10:21):
the break. No doubt, the FBI was hoping for much
more with Zeb, some sort of headline grabbing criminal case
related to a bomb plot or a plan to kill
a politician. But Zeb never moved beyond tough guy talk,
and tough guy talk isn't a crime. The FBI got

(10:43):
Zeb on what's sometimes called a backup charge. FBI agents
will often entice targets to commit lower level crimes, in
Zeb's case, buying a gun for a felon, so that
if the big case doesn't work out, at least they
have something to show for all the work and all
the taxpayer money poured into their investigation. In Zeb's case,

(11:06):
there are two problems, and I think they highlight the
fundamental absurdity and unfairness at work here. The first is
that Mickey and the FBI had engineered a relationship with
Zeb in which Mickey was the alpha. Mickey portrayed himself
as dangerous and violent. He had pictures of dead ISIS
fighters on his phone when Zeb bought the gun for Mickey.

(11:29):
How much of what he did was driven by fear
of Mickey? And I'm thinking, oh, yeah, this dude is
fucking crazy, But I don't think it hit completely that
he was complete fed at some points. But when he
asked me to do that shit, I was like, whoa fuck.
I knew I wasn't safe if I said no. And second,

(11:50):
what Zeb did only happened because the FBI secretly enabled
every step of the process. They gave him money to
give to me. You know, right, so you use the
So you basically use FBI money to buy a gun
that essentially went back to the FBI. Yeah, your tax moment,

(12:12):
Our tax moment. Zeb ultimately decided to plead guilty to
his felony case. This is not at all uncommon for
an American in his position. The federal criminal justice system
is designed to produce plea deals. Over ninety seven percent
of all criminal convictions in federal court are the result

(12:33):
of plea agreements. This is due entirely to the horribly
lopsided risk of taking a federal criminal case to trial.
If Zeb had presented his case to a jury, pitting
his overworked public defender against the limitless resources of the
Justice Department, he would have risked spending up to ten
years in prison. But if Zeb takes a plea deal,

(12:54):
the Justice Department will recommend that he not spend any
time in prison. I felt that if I fought it,
they found some way to label me as a domestic terrorist,
and so I figured, yeah, it's better to take the plea.
Zeb has no real choice here. He's screwed. The house

(13:17):
always wins, well, maybe not always. The summer of twenty twenty,
all that anger and fear, can we really say anything changed? Maybe?

(13:39):
I mean there's been some accountability. In Aurora, Colorado, the
police officers and paramedics responsible for the death of Elijah McClain,
the unarmed black man who was injected with a lethal
dose of ketamine. They were indicted on state criminal charges,
now a thirty two count indictment. Officers, a former officer,

(14:01):
and two paramedics each face account of manslaughter and criminally
negligent homicide. Four of the five also face assault charges,
and a federal jury ordered the city and County of
Denver to pay millions and damages to demonstrators who were
injured by police during the protests. Denver has to pay
up big time fourteen million dollars to twelve people over

(14:23):
the police department's use of force during protest over the
murder of George Floyd. This civil case was the first
in the nation to take to trial accusations of police
brutality during the summer of twenty twenty. A jury ruled
in favor of protesters today who say dept violated their
civil rights and used excessive force when officers used tear

(14:44):
gas and fired pepperballs at them back in twenty twenty
oh and remember Colorado Springs gendercover cop with her pink hair.
Those activists got some results too. The city ended up
settling a lawsuit with the family of the Von Bay
who's fatally shot in the back by a police officer,
for three million dollars. No doubt, public pressure and all

(15:10):
those demonstrations played a role in making those small changes.
In that way, Zeb and the other protesters accomplished something,
but it came at a cost. For Zeb. He's pleaded
guilty to a felony charge, and with his sentencing hearing
coming up, he's concerned that, despite assurances to the contrary,

(15:34):
the judge could sentence him to prison for using the
government's money to buy a gun for the government's agent,
who then gave it to the government. On September seventh,
twenty twenty two, zeb walks into the federal courthouse in
Denver for a sentencing hearing. An hour later, he calls me, Hey,

(15:56):
what the d are you doing? Hey? Zeb, how are
you add all right? Got a three years probation, They says,
I could probably get off after one the probation, and
the prosecutor they argued for three. My attorney argued for one.
But they kind of tied it to political events coming up,
maybe the twenty twenty four election and any other events,

(16:17):
because they directly brought up the January sixth incident, saying that,
you know, it's the potential that if something like that
happened again, mister Hawker just just swept up into it.
So do you feel Do you feel good about it? Uh? No, dude,
I don't. I don't deserve it, and I don't feel

(16:39):
good that they want to cover up the fact that local, state,
and federal law enforcement caused violence here. I don't feel
good about it. I don't feel good about it. So
here's something interesting. During the hearing, Zeb's judge mentioned January sixth.

(17:00):
Direction It's interesting because as the FBI and the Justice
Department were focused on racial justice groups, they turned a
blind eye to right wing extremists who ultimately stormed the
US capital. David Bowditch, the FBI deputy director who compared

(17:21):
the racial justice protests to nine to eleven, had said
just days before January sixth, that the bureau was ready
to respond to any problems. Boutich and the FBI were,
of course, proven very wrong. After January sixth, Boutich quietly

(17:44):
retired from the FBI. The immediate reaction among right wing
news media and politicians was to tap into the same
narrative they'd used during the summer of twenty twenty that
Antifa was the boogeyman. We really don't know who is

(18:05):
behind this. I guess you could call these, for lack
of a better word, antifa like tactics. We don't know
if Antiva is out there. January sixth, maybe it was Antifa.
If Antifa was there, we need to root it out
and to make sure that that's called out because it
shouldn't be blamed on groups that weren't responsible. The last
couple of times we've seen these rallies, it hasn't just

(18:26):
been the President's supporters. We have seen Antifa, We have
seen Black Lives Matter. These claims and many others like them,
had an effect exaggerating the threat of anti fascist activists
while downplaying the threat of right wing extremists. Even the FBI,
from top to bottom, appeared to be influenced by the
Antifa boogeyman claims. Here's Michael Jerman, a former FBI agent

(18:50):
who regularly testifies before Congress. How can you not have
seen the way the Proud Boys have committed violence all
across the country in the four years prior to January sixth.
They had committed violence in Washington, DC at Trump rallys
in November and December of twenty twenty. Agents had fallen
for the false narrative about Antifa activists, and that allowed

(19:14):
for a deadly bias that somebody in a position authority
of the FBI could have such a divergent view of
the necessary preparations the FBI should be making for a
Black Lives Matter protest versus an increasingly public white supremacists
and far right militant violence, I think highlights that bias.

(19:44):
In Senate testimony two months after the insurrection, Jill Sanborn,
then the FBI's Assistant director for counter Terrorism, was asked
why the FBI was unaware of social media communications concerning
planning for the attack on the Capitol. Under our authorities,
we cannot collect First Amendment protected activities without sort of

(20:05):
the next step, which is the intent. And so we'd
have to have an already predicated investigation that allowed us
access to those comms and or a leader or a
tip from a community citizen or a fellow law enforcement
partner for us to gather that information. That isn't true.
It's total bullshit, because that's exactly what the FBI did

(20:29):
in Denver in the summer of twenty twenty. The issue
in stopping January sixth wasn't the FBI's lack of power
and authority. The issue was that the FBI was blinded
by its own hand. It was running around trying to
create bad guys in the racial justice movement while ignoring

(20:51):
the very real bad guys who would soon bring violence
to the US capital. On top of all that, the
FBI helped us roy the racial justice movement. Just look
at what happened in Colorado. Racial justice leaders like Trey
Quinn began to disengage following the rampant mistrust that Mickey

(21:11):
had created. The Denver chapter of the Young Democratic Socialists
of America imploded after Mickey used the group in its
members to bolster his credibility among the demonstrators. There's no
longer a y DSA in Denver. Eventually, the mass demonstrations
intended to call attention to the deaths of young black

(21:31):
Americans at the hands of police. They stopped. Some of this,
no doubt, was a natural occurrence. All political movements eventually stopped,
but the FBI's undercover work in Colorado hastened that collapse.
Mickey's work for the FBI follows a long pattern. The

(21:52):
FBI did the same thing in the nineteen sixties. We
had congressional investigations reforms, and we told ourselves, this doesn't
happen anymore. But it does happen. It happened in Denver
in the summer of twenty twenty. That summer, President Trump

(22:13):
and right wing media told us that we needed to
be afraid of the Antifa boogeyman. It turns out they
were right. There was an Antifa boogeyman. He drove a
silver hearse filled with guns. He advocated for violence and destruction,

(22:36):
and he was created and controlled by the US government,
by the FBI. And now I need to find Mickey.

(22:58):
I'm parked near some rundown apartments south of Denver in
the city of Sheridan. There are two square, white buildings.
Each building is split in half, with two units on
each side, one upstairs, the other downstairs. The apartments are
designed in what's known as shotgun style. If you were
to fire a gun from the front door, it had

(23:19):
passed through the back door, a straight line from door
to door. This is the apartment that Cassie Windecker shared
with Mickey, the same one where Mickey was arrested for
grabbing Cassie by the neck and slamming her against the table.
I had long assumed that Mickey wouldn't talk to me,

(23:39):
after all, remember his life rule fucked the three piece,
the politicians, the press, and the police. I mean, we
know now that's not exactly true about the police. Mickey
was a professional snitch, but I figured he was likely
serious about at least one of the other peas. Still

(24:02):
I want to find him to try to talk to him.
While reporting out this podcast, I met with a lot
of people who knew Mickey. Most were terrified of him,
and many didn't want to be recorded or have their
names revealed. Several of these people told me the same thing,
Mickey isn't in Denver any longer. But then I did

(24:25):
get this one tip. My best chance of finding him
go to his old apartment. The guy who lives there,
i was told, is Mickey's close friend in journalism. Doorstepping
his industry slang for an unannounced visit. It's a last resort,

(24:46):
you doorstep someone when other efforts have failed. And I've
done this enough to know the likeliest outcome is that
no one answers the door, even if someone is home.
So I write a note, leave along with my business card,
and say I'm interested in speaking with Mickey, but it's
worked for the FBI. Hello. I can see inside through

(25:14):
the closed screen door. The apartment is a mess, piles
of stuff everywhere, with strangely several vacuum cleaners lined up
against the wall. One of the bedroom doors is closed,
and no one's responding. I placed my note in business
card under the door, and I leave, and later that

(25:42):
evening I get a surprise when Mickey actually calls me,
but I missed the call and it goes to voicemail. Yeah,
this is Michael Vindecker. This is the voicemail and its entirety.
L you know now that address you went to a
post in that piece of paper saying that I worked

(26:04):
for the FBI, and shit, I don't live there. I
haven't lived there at months. But if you post something
a story about me saying I suppose I worked for
the FBI, will sue the shit out of you. I
will take you to court and I will break you
off in court for declamation and character as slander. I've
already notified my attorney about this. My previous land or
notified me and seventy of these papers that you put

(26:24):
on the old door I used to live that stating
that I worked for the FBI. I do not work
for the FBI. I've never worked for the FBI. Do
a proof of me working for the FBI, then I'll
say otherwise, but there's no proof because I didn't work
for them. Don't be posting stuff on my old apartments
to are my neighbors. My old neighbors are thinking that
I'm an FBI consultant or whatever the hell it is. Okay,

(26:46):
if you do that again, I promise you I will
sue you. That's a guarantee. Don't fucking do that again.
Don't come to my old house. Don't be posting stuff
that's not true. Twenty minutes later, I receive another voicemail
from a block number. I'm just letting you know. Michael

(27:06):
Winnicker has not lived at this address for probably now
since midfall last year. Remember, I had heard that a
friend of Mickey's still lives at the apartment where I
left the note. So I asked that you'd please not
come by my address again. I do not need heat
on my house. If you do come back by my

(27:31):
house or apartment, I will notify my local law enforcement.
Do not send anybody else in your police I do
not mess around with stuff like this. Thank you for
your time, good look, and goodbye. It doesn't take a

(27:53):
master of deduction to figure out what likely happened here.
I left the note by the door. Mickey's friend found
it and he called Mickey. They then come up with
a plan. The friend will call me and say he
doesn't know how to reach Mickey, leaving me at a
dead end. It's a solid plan, honestly, if Mickey's looking
not to be found. But if this was the plan,

(28:17):
Mickey screwed it up. This voicemail would have been the
dead end. But Mickey couldn't stop himself from calling me first,
and he does what we now know he does when
he's cornered. He lashes out and makes threats he's going
to sue me, Mickey claims break me off for defamation,

(28:37):
as he put it. And Mickey didn't call from a
block number, so I call him back and he answers, Hello, Hi,
this is Trevor. I'm sorry I missed your call. Yeah, Trevor,
this is Michael Bindeck. I got a call from my
landlord that you posted a note on my older partment

(28:58):
that used to prove that state and I was an
h console or something like that. Yeah. So, so I'm
a journalist and I'm doing a story on your work
with the FBI during the summer of twenty twenty, and
I've been trying to reach you, um twenty you did.
I have records in video and audio proving this. Records

(29:18):
in video and audio, will be working with the FBI.
That seems kind of weird because I didn't work with
the FBI. You were paid UM five thousand dollars every
two weeks during the during your work with them. That's
not true. Well that's what the records say. But I
would love to talk to you about this. UM, I
let to interview you about your work during the summer
twenty twenty. No. See, the thing I don't do is

(29:41):
I don't talk to the press. I don't talk to politicians,
and I don't talk to police. So Mickey then threatens
again to sue me for defamation if I report that
he worked for the FBI, and he hangs up. So
I call back. Do you reach Commandard your major Smokey
at the tone? You know what to do. Hey, Mickey,

(30:04):
this is Trevor Aaronson. I know you're probably surprised you
have gotten my call, so I understand why you would
have reacted the way you did. I just want to
make clear that I have definitive proof that you are
working with the FBI. These include records, these include audio,
and these include video. And this is absolutely unambiguous. So

(30:25):
what I'm hoping to do is to get you to
kind of tell what happened. You know, getting your account
of what happened is very important. I understand that you
would have various reasons to not want to be exposed
as an FBI informant, but that's likely going to happen
no matter what with this project. So I would very
much like to talk to you, So give me a

(30:46):
call and let me know how he can how he
might arrange this. Mickey has never responded. I followed up
with text and additional calls. I've also sent them screenshots
of some of the FBI undercover videos to prove to
him that I'm not bluffing. Still nothing. He clearly doesn't
want to talk to me about his work for the
FBI during the summer of twenty twenty, and the FBI

(31:08):
doesn't want to answer any questions either. The FBI's press
office declined to make anyone available for an interview and
refuse to provide written responses to a list of questions
I sent. The day after Mickey calls me, a head
over to zeb Hall's apartment in Denver. It's a three

(31:28):
story building. Zeb's place is on the top floor. Inside
the kitchen and living room are together a single room.
It's sparsely furnished. ZEB has a large desk in the
corner and a couch facing a television. What did you
just doing a sound check? Okay, I set up my
recording equipment. ZEB is setting in a chair next to
his desk. I'm on his couch. So the first thing

(31:50):
I wanted to talk to you about was I finally
got a hold of Mickey. Oh yeah, and he left
me a message. One to play it for you and
for your reaction. I play Mickey's voicemail for Zeb. Don't
be posted it stuff on my old apartments for are
my neighbors. My old neighbors are thinking that I've an
FBI consulting or whatever the hell it is. Okay, if
you if you do that again, I promise you I

(32:12):
will suit you that the guarantee. Don't fucking do that again.
I don't come to my old house. Don't be posted
stuff is stopped? True? What do you think of that?
But he got paid though it wasn't a donation. You know,
it's like, you know, hey, man, I didn't work for him,
but you know they gave me some brid for like

(32:33):
you know, yeah, the payment records I have for Mickey
appeared to be incomplete, but what I have shows he
was paid every two to three weeks, sometimes five thousand dollars,
sometimes a little less. I can confirm that he made
more than twenty thousand dollars working for the FBI that summer,
though I suspect Mickey earned significantly more. FBI informants can

(32:55):
make an excess of six figures a year. The fact
that was paid a lot of money by the FBI
is significant because FBI internal reports suggest that Mickey wasn't
motivated by money to work as an informant, but instead
by a desire to be a good samaritan. Who is

(33:15):
going to believe or want to work with a good
samaritan who has all these charts, It doesn't make any sense.
Zeb's talking about Mickey's many criminal charges, including assault, sexual assault,
and menacing with a weapon. American incident is best at
the end of that point, I'm pretty sure there's some
good people in the FBI. Well the FBI and sitting there,

(33:37):
you know, it's a yeah, yeah, America didn't send its
best in Mickey Windecker. I don't know if Mickey's still
working for the FBI as a policy, the FBI will
neither confirm nor deny that anyone is an informant. One
of Mickey's friends had told me that he'd stopped working

(33:58):
for the FEDS, and then he's now living in Nashville,
clocking hours as a motorcycle mechanic. I called as many
motorcycle shops in Nashville as I could find, and no
one had heard of a Mickey Windecker. And it gave
me chills just now, because he's a bad guy. Bad

(34:20):
guys are tracking bad guys, and I feel like he's
gonna keep doing this forever. Cassie, Mickey's third ex wife,
had told me that Mickey is such a master of
deception and has so many people who will cover for
him wittingly and unwittingly, that it's impossible to know what's true.

(34:41):
If someone claims Mickey's in Nashville, Cassie says, then it's
a good bet he's not in Nashville. Cassie believes her
ex husband is a kind of dark force, riding into
town after town to extract financial game from the suffering
of others. She thinks Mickey is out there, still working

(35:04):
for the FBI and still trying to set up unsuspecting
guys like zep Hal, Bryce Shelby and Trey Quinn. One
thing I've learned is they will use a little fish
to get the big fish. And I think in these
cases they use the big fish to get all the
little fish, because Mickey is he's a shark and not

(35:26):
on the good, bad assway and nasty sharks, and you know,
if they can get a bunch of little fish and
a bunch of you know, just just just get people,
you know, and hurt them, and you know, especially the
Black Lives Matters thing. You know, when you told me
about that, I was just like, great, this is like
a carnival for him. He doesn't give a shit about people.

(35:48):
He doesn't give a shit about helping people or you know,
making their lives better. No, he's doing it to make money.
And I don't know how much longer he's gonna keep roaming.
This reads, but it's almost like talking about the night
Stalker or something, you know, or Jeffrey Dahmer, like when
are they gonna get caught? You know, they're out there

(36:08):
and they're gonna do it again. I too, think Mickey's
out there somewhere behind the wheel of a silver hearse
secretly taking orders from the FBI. Well, I guess not
so secretly anymore. This was Trojan Hearse Season one of

(36:42):
Alphabet Boys and coming very soon season two. So you
do personal security all over the world. You're connected to
all these different people. It's an alphabet soup with the CIA,
the d EA, and the FBI all mixed up in
the same case. And you had to somebody call you
and say, can you get grenades and nuns for this

(37:04):
guy in Columbia? Specifi A lot of Ammunians Ammunisian. It's
the story of a jet setting Romanian businessman, a brash
Columbian drug runner, a call to the CIA, and a
seventeen million dollar arms deal that goes really really wrong.

(37:37):
At the center of everything is Flavia. But who is Flavia?
When I land, there's Flavio in a suit, It's like
follow me? Is he a secret agent? And he slams
down his badge in my passport and they just stamp it,
and I'm like, something's going on here? Is he an

(38:01):
arms dealer? You have your friends because I have right
now in my n or is Flavio something else? Entirely?
This college from an innate quis in Alphabet Boys Season

(38:24):
two coming soon. Alphabet Boys is a production of Western
Sound Nightheart Podcasts. It's reported, written and hosted by Me.
Trevor Aaronson. Bennett Dare and I are the executive producers.
Colin McNulty is our showrunner. The producer is Nicole McNulty.
Original composition in mastering is by Alex mckinnis. Sound designed

(38:45):
by Alex and Dan Leone. Eleanor Knight is our production
assistant and fact checker. Additional production help from Victoria Sefflett
Installa Hartman. Additional research by Marco Williams. Sam Pearson designed
our cover art. Special thanks Brian Loma. Executive producers for
iHeart Podcasts are Nick Stump, Bethan Macaluso, and Lindsay Hoffman.

(39:06):
For more information about this series or to drop us
a tip, head to Alphabet Boys dot xyz. You can
contact me on Twitter or Instagram at Trevor Aaronson. We
believe this story is important and could result in changes
to FBI oversight in public policy. But to have impact,
people need to hear the story, so we need your help. First,

(39:27):
tell your friends about the show. Personal recommendations are the
best recommendations. Second, spread the word on social media. At
alphabet boys dot xyz, you'll find FBI undercover recordings and
secret documents. You can share the stuff the government never
wanted public. Third, help us ride the algorithms by leaving

(39:48):
a rating or review on your favorite podcast app that
helps other people find us. And finally, thanks so much
for listening.