Purveyor Of Debunked Tucson Sex-Camp Claim Arrested: 5 Things

TUCSON, AZ — The advocate for homeless veterans whose now-debunked claims of a sex trafficking bunker at an abandoned homeless shelter gained traction internationally has been arrested for suspicion of trespassing, the Pima County Sheriff’s Office said.

Investigators obtained a probable cause warrant to arrest Michael Lewis Arthur Meyer, the founder of the Veterans on Patrol advocacy group, after viewing YouTube videos that he posted at the abandoned camp, the sheriff’s office said. He faces felony charges.

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Meyer and his Veterans on Patrol, which works to get homeless veterans off the street, discovered the abandoned camp near West Valencia Road and Interstate 19 in late May.

He blasted his find on social media, claiming restraints on trees, a baby crib and stroller, hair dye, an outdoor bathroom, pornographic material, and an underground bunker with dressers and crates large enough for children all pointed to a sex trafficking operation. (Get Tucson Patch’s real-time news alerts and free morning newsletters. Like us on Facebook. Also, download the free Patch iPhone app or free Patch Android app.)

Meyer’s story attracted the attention of former Navy SEAL Craig Sawyer, who is filming “Contraland,” a documentary exploring child sex trafficking. He told television station KOLD it looked like someone had been there about 10 days earlier.

“I didn’t expect to see something this heinous and inhumane this close,” Sawyer said. “I served in the military to keep things like this from happening here that’s why I risked my security, so nobody here would have to put up with this.”

The story claiming nefarious activities at the camp was picked up not only by mainstream and internet media sites, including Patch, but also by conspiracy theory websites. Even when investigators said in early June there was no indication the site was was used as a holding area for children trafficked in the sex trade and that the only criminal activity there was trespassing, the story continued to circulate.

Deputy Daniel Jelineo, a Pima County Sheriff’s Department spokesman, told the Arizona Daily Star authorities were investigating Meyer on another matter when they found the videos on YouTube that prompted his arrest.

Jelineo told the Daily Star investigators are looking into other incidents involving Meyer, but didn’t elaborate.

Here are five things to know about Meyer:

Meyer said on social media that he had found a child’s skull in the desert around the same time he claimed to have stumbled on a sex trafficking operation. However, it turned out to be the skull of an adult and was found in an area known to be used by migrants crossing illegally into Arizona from Mexico. A sheriff’s office spokesman told the Daily Star there was no indication the skull was linked in “any sort of sex trafficking.”

Meyer is a former drug addict and dealer whose rap sheet dates back to his childhood, according to radio station KKJZ. After the birth of his daughter, he gave up most of his vices and began focusing on activism surrounding veteran suicides. He was motivated to create Veterans on Patrol in part by the 2011 car-accident death of his fishing buddy, an Iraq War veteran, whose wife had told Meyer he had contemplated suicide. About 20 veterans a day die by suicide, according to the Veterans Administration.

Meyer said last year he has more or less “dropped out” of society and has no bank account, health insurance or credit history. He told KKJZ that when he’s not living among veterans at the three camps established by Veterans on Patrol, he stays with friends or at one of the apartments of former residents of the camp. “The only way I can get to these veterans is to go through it myself because that’s the only way you can develop the compassion and patience,” he told the radio station. “You can’t fix this in a week.”

In 2016, Meyer and other agitators showed up in Oregon at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge building family members of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy were occupying as part of a protest of government overreach. The two groups got into a scuffle, and one of Meyer’s group ended up in the hospital with his eye blackened. Meyer, who calls himself an anti-violence patriot, blamed the melee on Blaine Cooper, one of the militants occupying a federal building. He claimed the Bundy group didn’t go along with his plan to remove women and children and prominent militant Ryan Payne from the compound, The Oregonian reported. Militant Jason Patrick disputed that, writing on Facebook at the time that Meyer “assaulted a guard” while trying to enter the compound. Meyer told The Oregonian he and Payne were once friends and both had participated in the armed standoff at Cliven Bundy’s Ranch in 2014, but the relationship soured when Payne became more radical. “He made it very clear out there that he wanted the federal government to go and take him out,” Meyer said. “I had to come up here because I know what he wants.”

Meyer was arrested twice in 2015 for climbing flag poles in Surprise to call attention to veteran suicides. “I climbed to the top of an 80 foot light pole, with an American flag. I held the flag, inverted, a sign of distress, to bring attention to the distress being felt by those veterans of recent wars who have served their country, with honor,” he wrote on Facebook after one of the arrests. “Their distress is a consequence of the government’s failure to care for those who have cared for our country and freedom.Those veterans are dying more quickly at home than they are in Afghanistan and Iraq. They are committing suicide at an average rate of 22, every single day, of every year. They are joined by an average of one active duty soldier, added to their number, every day.”

Photo via Pima County Sheriff’s Office