CARO, Mich. (WWJ) -- A member of a white supremacist group will serve probation, avoiding jail time after pleading no contest to crimes including assessing whether vacant state properties in Michigan could be used for paramilitary training.
A member of The Base – a national white supremacist group that's alleged to advocate for violence against the government – was sentenced by a Tuscola County judge, Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel announced on Friday.
Judge Amy Gierhardt on Wednesday deferred jail time and sentenced 20-year-old Tristan Alexander Webb to a lengthy probation term, with strict supervision from the court.
Webb was the fourth Base member convicted in Tuscola or Washtenaw counties since charges were filed in this case in 2020.
Nessel said Webb was sentenced as follows:
- Count 2, Gang Felonies: Probation 5 years.
- Count 3, Conspiracy to Train with Firearms for a Civil Disorder: Probation 3 years, 1 year of jail deferred.
- Count 4, Felony Firearm: 2-year delay of sentence consecutive to the other counts.
Count 1, a larceny charged, was dismissed as part of a plea deal.
Webb became involved with The Base when he was 17 years old, the AG said. In late 2019, it's alleged that Webb hosted a “hate camp” at his three-acre property in the Thumb, with member of The Base, “Invictus Youth,” and “Aryan Resistance” attending.
It was alleged that Webb and two other men broke into two vacant Michigan Department of Correction properties — MDOC Camp Tuscola Annex and MDOC Tuscola Residential ReEntry Program — in October of 2020, and stole some clothing.
The AG said the men were assessing the properties as potential training grounds for future "hate camps" — where they would conduct paramilitary firearms training exercises.
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“My department will hold accountable any individual that commits crimes as part of a domestic terrorist organization,” said Nessel, in a statement. “Make no mistake, these are violent gangs intent on harming others and their actions will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”
The FBI said a raid on Webb's home found it stocked with gas masks, a machete, knives, a sword decorated with a Nazi symbol, tactical gear, camouflage clothing, a shirt with a Nazi Wolf's Hook logo on it and a guitar emblazoned with white nationalist symbols.
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The AG's office says the The Base – which is the literal translation of “Al-Qaeda” in English – is a "white supremacy gang that openly advocates for violence and criminal acts against the U.S.," and purports to be training for a race war to establish white ethnonationalist rule in Michigan's Upper Peninsula and other areas of the U.S. The group, which was founded in 2018, is also alleged to traffic in Nazi ideology and extreme anti-Semitism.
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