Marvin Heemeyer

Marvin Heemeyer was born on October 28, 1951, in South Dakota and lived in Grand Lake, Colorado, about 16 miles (26 km) away from Granby.[2] According to a neighbor, Heemeyer moved to town more than ten years before the incident. His friends stated that he had no relatives in the Granby–Grand Lake area.[3]

John Bauldree, a friend of Heemeyer's, said that he was a likable person. Heemeyer's brother Ken stated that he "would bend over backwards for anyone." However, while many people described Heemeyer as an affable person, local resident Christie Baker claimed that her husband was threatened by Heemeyer after refusing to pay for a disputed muffler repair.[4] Baker said her husband later paid Heemeyer $124 via an intermediary.[4]

In 1992, Heemeyer purchased 2 acres (0.8 ha) of land from the Resolution Trust Corporation, the federal agency organized to handle the assets of failed savings and loan associations, for $42,000 to build a muffler shop. He subsequently agreed to sell the land to Cody Docheff to build a concrete batch plant, Mountain Park Concrete, for $250,000. According to Susan Docheff, Heemeyer changed his mind and increased the price to $375,000, then to a deal worth approximately $1 million. Some believed that this negotiation happened before the rezoning proposal was heard by the town council.[5]

In 2001, Granby's zoning commission and trustees approved the construction of the concrete plant. Heemeyer unsuccessfully appealed the decision, claiming the construction blocked access to his shop. He was subsequently fined $2,500[6] by the town council and a city judge for various violations, including "not being hooked up to the sewer line"; he had initially been unable to connect to the new sewer line as the line ran 60 feet (18 m) away from his property and the city expected him to pay the nearly $80,000 cost of laying the connector. After the concrete plant was built the city council denied him the easement necessary to join to the new line underneath it.[7]

Heemeyer used this armor-plated Komatsu D355A bulldozer to destroy 13 buildings in Granby, Colorado.

Heemeyer's bulldozer was a modified Komatsu D355A,[8] which he referred to as the "MK Tank" in audio recordings, fitted with makeshift armor plating covering the cabin, engine, and parts of the tracks. In places, this armor was over 1 foot (30 cm) thick, consisting of 5,000 psi (34 MPa) Quikrete concrete mix sandwiched between sheets of tool steel (acquired from an automotive dealer in Denver), to make ad-hoc composite armor. This made the machine impervious to small arms fire and resistant to explosives. Three external explosions and more than 200 rounds of ammunition fired at the bulldozer had no effect on it.[1]

For visibility, the bulldozer was fitted with several video cameras linked to two monitors mounted on the vehicle's dashboard. The cameras were protected on the outside by 3-inch (76 mm) shields of clear bulletproof lexan.[1] Compressed-air nozzles were fitted to blow dust away from the video cameras. Onboard fans and an air conditioner were used to keep Heemeyer cool while driving. He had made three gun-ports, fitted for a .50 caliber rifle, a .308 semi-automatic rifle, and a .22LR rifle, all fitted with a one-half-inch-thick (1.3 cm) steel plate. Heemeyer apparently had no intention of leaving the cabin once he entered it.[1] Authorities initially speculated that he may have used a homemade crane – found in his garage – to lower the armor hull over the dozer and himself. "Once he tipped that lid shut, he knew he wasn't getting out," Daly said. Investigators searched the garage where they believed that Heemeyer built the vehicle and found cement and armor steel.[1]

"It is interesting to observe that I was never caught", Heemeyer wrote. "This was a part-time project over a ​1 ¹⁄₂ year time period." He was surprised that several men, who had visited the shed late the previous year, had not noticed the modified bulldozer "especially with the 2,000-pound [910 kg] lift fully exposed ... somehow their vision was clouded."[9]

On June 4, 2004, Heemeyer drove his armored bulldozer through the wall of his former business, the concrete plant, the town hall, the office of the local newspaper that editorialized against him, the home of a former mayor (in which the mayor's widow then resided), and a hardware store owned by another man Heemeyer named in a lawsuit, as well as a few others. Heemeyer had leased his business to a trash company and sold the property several months before the rampage.

The attack lasted for two hours and seven minutes, damaging thirteen buildings,[8] knocking out natural gas service to the town hall and the concrete plant, damaging a truck, and destroying part of a utility service center.[10] Despite the great damage to property, no one besides Heemeyer was killed in the event (by a self-inflicted gunshot wound).[1] However, the modified bulldozer came to be known as "Killdozer" after the name of a short story by Theodore Sturgeon.[11] The damage was estimated at $7 million.[12][13] According to Grand County commissioner James Newberry, emergency dispatchers used the reverse 911 emergency system to notify many residents and property owners of the rampage going on in the town.[14]

Defenders of Heemeyer's contended that he made a point of not hurting anybody during his bulldozer rampage;[1] Ian Daugherty, a bakery owner, said Heemeyer "went out of his way" not to harm anyone. Others offered different views. The sheriff's department argued the fact that no one was injured was not due to good intent as much as to good luck. Heemeyer had installed two rifles in firing ports on the inside of the bulldozer,[15] and fired fifteen bullets from his rifle at power transformers and propane tanks. "Had these tanks ruptured and exploded, anyone within one-half mile (800 m) of the explosion could have been endangered," the sheriff's department said. Twelve police officers and residents of a senior citizens complex were within such a range.[5] Heemeyer fired many bullets from his semi-automatic rifle at Cody Docheff when Docheff tried to stop the assault on his concrete plant by using a wheel tractor-scraper, which was pushed aside by Heemeyer's bulldozer. Later, Heemeyer fired on two state patrol officers before they had fired at him.[5] The sheriff's department also noted that eleven of the thirteen buildings Heemeyer bulldozed were occupied until moments before their destruction. At the town library, for example, a children's program was in progress when the incident began.[2][5]

One officer dropped a flash-bang grenade down the bulldozer's exhaust pipe, with no apparent effect. Local and state patrol, including a SWAT team, walked behind and beside the bulldozer, occasionally firing, but the armored bulldozer was impervious to their shots. Attempts to disable the bulldozer's cameras with gunfire failed as the bullets were unable to penetrate the 3-inch (7.6 cm) bulletproof plastic. At one point, undersheriff Glenn Trainor climbed atop the bulldozer and rode it "like a bronc buster, trying to figure out a way to get a bullet inside the dragon".[2] However, he was forced to jump off to avoid being hit with debris.[2]

At this point, local authorities and the Colorado State Patrol feared they were running out of options in terms of firepower, and that Heemeyer would soon turn against civilians in Granby. Governor Bill Owens allegedly considered authorizing the National Guard to use either an Apache attack helicopter equipped with a Hellfire missile or a two-man fire team equipped with a Javelin anti-tank missile to destroy the bulldozer. This was quickly deemed unnecessary when Heemeyer became trapped in the basement of a Gambles hardware store. As late as 2011, Governor Owens's staff still vehemently denied considering such a course of action, but since then members of the State Patrol revealed that, to the contrary, the governor did consider authorizing an attack but ultimately decided against it due to the potential for collateral damage of a missile strike in the heart of Granby being significantly higher than what Heemeyer could have caused with his bulldozer.[16]

Two problems arose as Heemeyer destroyed the Gambles hardware store. The radiator of the bulldozer had been damaged and the engine was leaking various fluids, and Gambles had a small basement. The bulldozer's engine failed, and Heemeyer dropped one tread into the basement, but could not get out. About a minute later, one of the SWAT team members, who had swarmed around the machine, reported hearing a single gunshot from inside the sealed cab. It was later determined that Heemeyer had shot himself in the head with a .357-caliber handgun.[1][17]

Police first used explosives in an attempt to remove the steel plates, but after the third explosion failed, they cut through them with an oxyacetylene cutting torch. Grand County Emergency Management Director Jim Holahan stated that authorities were able to access and remove Heemeyer's body at 2 a.m. on June 5.[18]

In addition to writings that he left on the wall of his shed, Heemeyer recorded a number of audio tapes explaining his motivation for the attack. He mailed these to his brother in South Dakota shortly before stepping into his bulldozer. Heemeyer's brother turned the tapes over to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), who in turn sent them to the Grand County Sheriff's Department. The tapes were released by the Grand County Sheriff's Office on August 31, 2004. The tapes are about 2.5 hours in length.[20] The first recording was made on April 13, 2004. The last recording was made thirteen days before the rampage on May 22.

"God built me for this job," Heemeyer said in the first recording. He also said it was God's plan that he not be married or have a family so that he could be in a position to carry out such an attack. "I think God will bless me to get the machine done, to drive it, to do the stuff that I have to do," he said. "God blessed me in advance for the task that I am about to undertake. It is my duty. God has asked me to do this. It's a cross that I am going to carry and I'm carrying it in God's name."[21]

Investigators later found Heemeyer's handwritten list of targets. According to the police, it included the buildings he destroyed, the local Catholic church (which he did not damage), and the names of various people who had sided against him in past disputes.[22] Notes found by investigators after the incident indicated that the primary motivation for the bulldozer rampage was his plan to stop the concrete plant from being built near his shop. These notes indicated that he held grudges over the zoning approval. "I was always willing to be reasonable until I had to be unreasonable", he wrote. "Sometimes reasonable men must do unreasonable things."[9] Heemeyer's words later became a meme in the far-right extremist boogaloo movement as "I became unreasonable."[23]

• Leviathan — According to the director of the 2014 movie, Andrey Zvyagintsev, the story of Marvin Heemeyer inspired him and it was adapted into a Russian setting.[24]
• Tread[25] — 2020 documentary film based on the rampage.

• Shawn Nelson – perpetrator of a similar armored vehicle rampage in San Diego, California.

• Bagsarian, Tom (November 1, 2005). "Terror in Granby" (PDF). The Concrete Producer. Rosemont, IL: Hanley Wood. Archived from the original (PDF) on April 14, 2016. Retrieved January 17, 2016.

• Discovery Channel – Destroyed in Seconds video
• Washington Post Article
• Denver Channel Article
• CBS4: Bulldozer Rampage Revisited* News Coverage on YouTube
• "Site detailing Marvin Heemeyer's dispute with City Hall". Archived from the original on October 12, 2004. Retrieved September 20, 2005.CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)
• Granby Damage, includes several pictures of the incident
• "Rampage In Granby". The Denver Post. June 6, 2004.
• The Heemeyer Tapes at Internet Archive