FLORENCE, Colo.—Anti-government separatist LeRoy Schweitzer has been found dead at the Supermax prison in southern Colorado.
The Denver Post reports ( ) that the 73-year-old former leader of the Freeman group appears to have died of natural causes. A Federal Correctional Complex advisory announcing the death says an autopsy will be performed.
Schweitzer led a small, heavily armed anti-government group called the Freemen. Schweitzer’s arrest in 1996 prompted group members to barricade themselves in a 960-acre ranch compound in Jordan, Mont., for 81 days.
Schweitzer was serving a 22-year sentence for conspiracy to commit bank robbery, wire fraud, failure to file tax returns and fugitive possession of a firearm. He’d been serving his sentence in Colorado since 2006.
