Informant Page #4

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and y'all all leave me to clean

up the sh*t in your bucket.

You can't tell us not to,

it's like, I'm telling you,

don't sh*t in a bucket

or I will have you removed.

I'm not cleaning up

your sh*t in that bucket.

Bryson:
I was amazed

that he was so aggressive.

Mr. Darby was anti-police,

anti-establishment.

I was very skeptical whether or not

they were here to help or to hinder.

Brandon:

Chief Bryson called and he said,

"Hey, I found these young people

who said that you had,

you sent them around

with medications,

you know for the elderly people

and I know these people."

And I said, "Well that's what we do."

And he said,

well, I have a hard time disliking

you when you do things like that.

And I said well I'm having

a hard time disliking you

And shortly after that he

started really working with us.

That was the first time

in my life

that I'd really started

having those interactions.

Police were no longer "them."

- (Bryson laughs)

It was breaking that down a little bit,

to have to interact.

Woman:
How do you see in the future

empowering people in this community,

as they come back

to a devastated area?

We're willing to do it,

often times, and don't get scared,

I say by any means necessary,

that doesn't mean by violence.

You know, but when we say that

what we mean is like next month,

we're gonna have a delegation

going to Venezuela.

The intention with that is

to try and ask foreign nations

to pay for a couple

of health clinics.

To pay, to fund,

legally,

but to fund it,

to fund education.

When Brandon told me he was gonna

talk to Chavez in Venezuela,

I asked, "Are you f***ing crazy?"

I'm gonna say it the way it is.

He wanted to go and see

what revolutionaries were doing,

Interviewer:
What was the goal

in going to Venezuela?

It doesn't really make

that much sense to me.

The overt goal of going to Venezuela

was to get resources to buy shelter

for people in New Orleans.

And we figured if we did that,

then it would embarrass the U.S.

government enough that they would,

they would then do

what they were supposed to do.

Which in itself could be

construed as very illegal.

And I knew it,

and I didn't really care.

So, we go to Venezuela.

And it was beautiful, you know?

This revolutionary fervor

in young people.

It was lovely,

seeing so many people caring

and wanting to make change.

It was what I'd always dreamed of.

It was my dream.

Then it got much more complicated when

they were on the ground down there.

We connected

with the government.

And we ended up in a fairly

high official's... you know,

a high level of government.

The minister I had met with

asked me to meet with friends

of his from the oil industry.

And then the oil industry said

"Well, we think

if any money comes from Venezuela we

should do it through the oil industry.

I just need you to give us a sense

of what happened here in this room.

You start talking to me about getting into

wanting me to go with you to Columbia,

I don't know if you're

somebody who's just trying

to help the FARC

kidnap an American.

You know what I mean?

I don't know what you're doing.

Director:
Good.

Okay, let's go with that.

Action!

They mentioned to me that they knew

what was going on in New Orleans,

and they knew

what we were doing.

And they wanted me to meet with,

with the FARC.

Newsman:
The Revolutionary Armed

Forces of Columbia, or FARC.

Newsman 2:
The FARC, a rebel group that

for years controlled large swaths...

and on the State Department's list

of foreign terrorist organizations.

Brandon:
I wasn't opposed to

meeting with resistance movements,

and I wasn't opposed

to making sure I had support

if indeed the U.S. government did

what we though they would do,

which is kill us because we're disagreeing

with them in a successful way.

Challenging their power.

Part of me hoped that

the FARC was just noble people

who wanted

to end oppression.

Part of me didn't want

to meet with the FARC

because I felt as though

I'd be meeting with

narco-traffickers who kidnap people.

Part of me felt like

it could be a CIA plot.

I don't think I'm gonna go

meet with these people.

I don't think

I'm interested in it.

"No come with us.

Come with us."

These people are really

dedicated to me crossing

national boundaries

into Columbia with them.

Why? Like do they want

to kidnap me?

Is it the CIA trying to bust me?

Am I gonna get arrested if I don't go?

Or if I do go

am I gonna get arrested,

- I didn't know what to do.

- Interviewer:
How did you shake them?

How did you get them

off your back?

I told other parts of the...

leaders in other parts of the

government what they were doing.

Tell me about that.

Tell me what happened.

Ummmm,

I'm gonna take a break.

Lisa:

Maybe it was Brandon trying to find out

what revolutionary

really means.

Maybe his vision of what he saw

wasn't what he thought it was.

I don't know what he

thought it is... or was.

Caroline:

When Brandon came back from Venezuela,

I would describe what happened

maybe as a mental breakdown.

He was withdrawn, very paranoid

and very depressed.

I left Venezuela

feeling very confused.

I came back,

I couldn't sleep.

As a person,

I was breaking.

Scott:
Brandon, as much as any of us,

had post-traumatic stress.

You can't go through the things

we went through in New Orleans,

and then pile on Venezuela,

and be okay.

Brandon:
And it was just the

internal politics were killing me.

Caroline:

There was a lot of tension in the ranks.

A lot of people left

because folks didn't like him.

They didn't like

what he was doing,

they didn't like

his top-down approach.

He no longer believed

in the collectivist attitude,

the anarchist approach.

(phone chatter)

He ended up going off

the radar for a while.

Brandon:

I went back to Austin.

Everything I had kinda

believed in for so many years...

started crashing a little bit.

(sighs)

You know over time,

I guess...

yeah, I guess my views

just really changed.

I'm not so sure that...

I'm not so sure that

I'm completely right anymore.

You know, I'm not so sure

that turning my country...

because that's

what would happen, right?

Like we'd have a resistance

movement and if we were successful

and didn't get killed right

away or put in prison,

you know, then the best we could hope

for is to have what Columbia has, right,

which is just a sustained war where everyone

in the country knows what murder is,

deals with murder,

deals with kidnappings.

And it's like, you know,

I don't want that in my country.

What kind of thing could happen to be

that bridge between being a revolutionary

and going undercover

with the FBI?

And it's like well,

a lot of experiences in life.

A lot of doubts about views,

because of experiences

and growing older

and more perspective.

And then something absolutely

that radical coming up

that you have to say something about

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