An investigation by The Badger Project found Bayside Police Officer Ryan Bowe’s name on a leaked list of Oath Keepers. It’s unknown if he resigned due to that revelation.
By Peter Cameron, THE BADGER PROJECT
A police officer who signed up for membership with the right-wing, anti-government group Oath Keepers resigned from the Bayside Police Department earlier this month.
The early December resignation of Ryan Bowe comes about a month after an investigation posted Nov. 1 by The Badger Project noted his name was on a leaked Oath Keepers membership list. Bowe had been a Bayside police officer since 2006.
In a short email, Bayside Chief Tom Liebenthal directed questions about the resignation to Bowe, “as his letter of resignation did not specify the reason for his departure.”
Bowe did not respond to emails seeking comment.
In its investigation, The Badger Project found at least three active police officers in the Milwaukee area on the leaked membership list.
A second officer, Lt. Cory Dale Fuller, continues to work for the Bayside Police Department.
Liebenthal did not respond to requests for comment for the first story, which revealed that the two officers had signed up for Oath Keepers. But the chief did speak to the Wisconsin Law Journal in a follow-up story posted Nov. 3.
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“There is no indication of a need to be concerned about anything impacting work performance for these officers,” Liebenthal told the Wisconsin Law Journal. “Quite the opposite actually. We looked into it and there was no need to conduct a formal investigation.”
Liebenthal said Fuller and Bowe joined Oath Keepers in 2011 and 2013, respectively, and that their membership was brief.
The Badger Project also found a third officer, David Larsheidt of the Milwaukee Police Department, on the list.
Neither he nor the Milwaukee Police Association, the officer’s union, responded to The Badger Project’s requests for comment before the first story was posted, but a union official did speak to the Wisconsin Law Journal on the issue.
Milwaukee Police Association President Andrew Wagner told the news organization that Larscheidt joined Oath Keepers in 2010 or 2011 in support of what he thought was a pro-police group on Facebook.
When Larscheidt joined, Wagner said he received stickers in the mail, put them in a drawer, and since then has had no affiliation with the group.
Milwaukee Police Department spokesman Sgt. Efrain Cornejo told The Badger Project that the “Internal Affairs Division looked into the allegations and concluded that our member did not violate the Code of Conduct.”
Oath Keepers played a major role in the attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
In November 2022, Stewart Rhodes, founder and leader of Oath Keepers, and Kelly Meggs, leader of its Florida chapter, were found guilty of seditious conspiracy and other crimes related to the attack.
A trio of other defendants — Thomas Caldwell, Kenneth Harrelson and Jessica Watkins — all leaders and associates of the Oath Keepers, also were found guilty of related charges in November 2022.
More than 38,000 people across the United States are listed on the Oath Keepers membership roll, which The Badger Project obtained from the journalism organization Distributed Denial of Secrets or DDoSecrets. The organization calls itself “a publisher and archive for data leaked in the public interest.”
DDoSecrets received the list from an anonymous source, presumably through a hack of Oath Keepers’ records, Editor-in-Chief Lorax Horne said.
A 2022 investigation by the Anti-Defamation League found at least 600 names on the list were elected officials, law enforcement officers, military members and first responders, including six elected officials in Wisconsin.
The Badger Project is a nonpartisan, citizen-supported journalism nonprofit in Wisconsin.
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Categories: Investigations, Law enforcement
