ATF BAD BOY, LOU VALOZE: STOREFRONT UnderCover OPERATIVES | Seite 5

patched. He would walk among them for years,
ultimately resulting in 16 indictments.
It’s what came after that would haunt Dobyns.
The Hells Angels put out murder contracts to
other gang members – but beyond that were the
threats that went beyond the pale. Confirmed
letters outlining a plan to infect him with HIV,
kidnap and torture his kids, gang rape his wife
in front of cameras and make Dobyns watch the
video. When those threats were ignored by ATF,
Dobyns pushed back at management.
In 2008, ATF management pulled all of his
“backstopping,” placing Dobyns’ home address in
the public domain. Dobyns claims it was done in
retaliation, and has spent the intervening years
successfully fighting to get the truth out.
“In the history of ATF, they had never
unmasked an undercover agent’s identity. They
did that willingly. It was pure retaliatory payback.”
When it became known among the criminal
world who he was, who he really was, the knives
came out. Just four months after his address
became public knowledge, Dobyns had to flee with
his family as their home burned down around
them. His wife and children narrowly escaped the
flames.
Sitting in his backyard, smoke still coming off
the embers of his family’s home, Dobyns watched
as his 10-year-old son paced the yard, a framing
hammer in his hand. Young Jack told his father
the hammer was in case they come back. “He said
to me, ‘Who’s going to take care of mom? You’re
never here.’ That hit home.”
That moment, and so many moments of time
lost to his wife and his children, reframed Dobyns’
entire worldview. It made him look back at his
long career and come to the conclusion it had all
been a fraud.
“In self-evaluation, after having stepped away,
the ‘Ah, s__’ moment for me is the tragedy that I
caused my family, The battle damage that I put on
my family,” he said. “I abandoned and betrayed
my family in exchange for some legacy I believed
I was chasing. When I look back on my career, and
all these series of life-threatening events, when it
came down to it the people who loved me the most
are the people I treated the s___iest.”
He may view his career as a fraud, but try telling
that to the people who can sleep easier knowing a
violent criminal in their neighborhood is behind
bars. Try telling that to the babies, grandmas and
kids who didn’t die in a fiery blast on day in Las
Vegas. Despite what he may believe, the world is
a better place for Jay Dobyns’ long walk through
hell.
MIKE “CHOPPER” CONNORS
It was the worst-case scenario for an ATF
undercover agent; Mike Connors describes it as
“something out of a movie.”
He had been working with an informant
to infiltrate the criminal enterprises of white
supremacists all over the southeast, from
Southern Florida into Georgia, and one lead
had taken him straight up to the chief security
officer for the White Georgia Knights, Daniel
James Schertz. “He offered to make us some pipe
bombs,” said Connors. “He thought we’d be using
Mike Connors (left) and fellow ATF undercover agent Lou Veloze (right) at Gator
Smokes, an undercover storefront. Gator Smokes was one of many fake storefronts
created by ATF across the country. Posing as criminals, ATF agents would set up shop
and immerse themselves in the criminal underworld.
them to blow up migrant workers.”
The meeting was set up at Schertz’s home in
Pittsburg, Tennessee, and that’s when the worst-
case scenario began.
“The cover team couldn’t come up with us, it
was raining out, it was night, he lived at the end of
a long road that dead ended at his house, and as
we’re parking, he walks out the door with a gun in
his hand.”
Especially given that neither Connors nor his
informant had ever met Schertz in person, it could
have very easily ended in bloodshed. But being a
seasoned ATF undercover, Connors was able to
earn his target’s trust. At least, enough trust to
show Connors the shed around back, stuffed with
parts and tools for making deadly explosives.
“He had them in various states of completion,
but he said he still needed a few parts,” said
Connors. Fortunately, the necessary parts were
just a short drive away. “We rolled down to Lowe’s.
There are all these people walking around buying
stuff for their homes and here we are shopping for
pipe bomb components.”
Just $750 later, Connors walked away with his
pipe bombs, some advice on where to put them to
cause maximum destruction, and all the evidence
he needed to put Schertz away for 170 months in
federal prison. What disturbed Connors the most
was the glee Schertz expressed in knowing his
pipe bombs were going to kill innocent people just
because of the color of their skin.
“He thought I was the type who’d want to do
something to further the cause. That goes right
along with the hatred that they spew… They’re
very paranoid people, but I think they get very
excited when someone out there is going to
take some action that they would consider to be
heroic,” he said. It was par for the course when
it came to white supremacists, a group he’d
immersed himself in as part of his cover. “I’d been
to gatherings where they had music going and kids
were boot stomping black dummies. The whole
mentality and the culture is sick.”
RANDAL “TOO HOT TOO
HANDLE” BEACH
Although every undercover agent has their own
persona, they all tend to fall into the same general
category: the heavily tattooed criminal badass
whose good side you want to stay firmly on.
Randal Beach always took a different approach.
“I’ve done some goofball stuff,” he said with
a laugh. A seasoned undercover officer who’d
worked cases for the FBI, DEA and the local
sheriff’s office before heading to ATF, Beach’s
undercover persona tended to skew more toward
the dirty drifter than the smooth-talking gun
runner.
“I’d take a ballpoint pen and destroy my arms
so it would look like it had track marks, I’d wear
clothes that I’d stuff in a bag so they’d get all moldy
and nasty… I did some nasty, unsexy undercover
work,” he said. Along with the general rode-hard-
and-put-away-wet look, Randall would cultivate a
generally busted façade through props like a fake
cast, mismatched shoes and a flea-bitten old dog.
Obviously, this caused problems at home.
“My wife told me , ‘When you’re home, do
you have to dress like you’re going to a Charles
Manson lookalike contest?... You need to do
something about your hair. I’m sick of the way
you look.’ So I went and shaved my head and told
everyone I’d murdered somebody so I need to
change my appearance.”
It’s an off-the-wall approach, but Beach played
it to perfection. In Savannah, he and his partner
Lou Valoze posed as construction workers,
infiltrating street gangs like the infamous David
Banks crew, buying up crime guns that would
otherwise flood the streets. Living and working
undercover in the city where he lived posed its
own unique set of challenges.
SOUTH
June | July 2019
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