On Jan. 20, Border Agent David Maland pulled over a vehicle in Coventry, Vermont, a town about 20 miles from the Canadian border. The reasons for the traffic stop are unclear. The driver of the vehicle, Teresa Youngblut, and the passenger, Felix Bauckholt, who went by the name "Ophelia," had been flagged by local authorities as acting suspiciously. Both were seen clothed in "tactical dress" and armed.
When Maland pulled the vehicle over, shots rang out. Maland was hit and other border agents returned fire. Bauckholt died at the scene. Maland was also seriously injured and died of his wounds.
Here's where the rabbit hole begins to get very deep.
Youngblut and Bauckholt were members of a radical group whose goals and ideology are a pastiche of new-age nonsense. They call themselves "Zizians" after the nom de guerre of their leader, Jack "Ziz" LaSota, who identifies as a woman. The cult-like group consists of radical vegans who believe that artificial intelligence can end the world.
LaSota has postulated a theory that the "hemispheres of the brain could hold separate values and genders and 'often desire to kill each other,'" according to The Telegraph.
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The gun used by Youngblut was connected to the Dec. 31, 2022, killings of Richard and Rita Zajko in Pennsylvania. Their daughter, Michelle Zajko, was arrested on Monday in Maryland with LaSota and a California man, Daniel Blank, for trespassing, obstructing an investigation, and other charges.
Zajko was arrested in connection with the death of her parents, as was LaSota, but both were later released. LaSota is still wanted on weapons charges in California and for questioning in two other murders. He keeps showing up around the scenes of murders, six in all.
LaSota tried to fake his own death in 2022.
LaSota, a computer programmer previously associated with a Berkeley-based organization that seeks to use mathematical and logical principles to improve the world, was said to have died in a boating accident in August 2022, according to a brief obituary that appeared in her [sic] hometown newspaper in Alaska.
But since then, LaSota, who identifies as a woman, and her associates have been linked to a series of violent attacks, including a 2022 stabbing that left an 80-year-old man partially blind. That victim was killed last month in a homicide that prosecutors said had was intended to keep him from testifying in the trial linked to the initial attack, which is scheduled to begin this spring.
LaSota has not been charged in connection with that killing, but authorities found her at the scene of the attack in 2022, just three months after she had supposedly died, according to an email a prosecutor sent to one of LaSota’s attorneys at the time.
The cult members have generally been described as "brilliant," with several having worked for Google and NASA. A cult member in California, Maximillian Snyder, an Oxford-trained computer scientist, is going on trial for the murder of 80-year-old Curtis Lind, who was assaulted by Zizians in 2022. Snyder is the recipient of a prestigious artificial intelligence prize.
Lind was murdered a month before he was to testify, allegedly by Snyder.
Lind shot at his attackers, injuring Leatham and killing Borhanian. Court records show that Leatham and Dao have since been charged with the murder of their friend, Borhanian, and the attempted murder of Lind, along with an aggravated mayhem charge.
Posts on the online forum LessWrong.com allege that the three people involved in the 2022 stabbing are associated with Jack LaSota, who goes by Ziz and appears to be the inspiration for the fringe ideology built on a shared affinity for veganism and artificial intelligence theory, among other beliefs. Documents obtained by Open Vallejo indicate that LaSota lived on the Vallejo property with Leatham and Borhanian, among others.
The Zizians are in thrall to a charismatic, evil genius who adheres to a radical, dangerous ideology. I'm not sure we've hit the bottom of this particular rabbit hole yet.
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