Drop the baton. Drop the taser. Drop the cuffs. On the ground now. The four Sentinel guards froze.
The one with the taser dropped it first. The other three followed. The leader, the one who had swung the baton, raise both hands slowly. He had the face of a man who had been waiting 11 years for this exact morning and had not realized until 91 seconds ago that he had been waiting. The sprinter rounded the corner 2 seconds later.
Eight more agents poured out. They cleared the cart. They cleared the front yard. They cleared the four Sentinel men onto their stomachs in my grass and zipcuffed them in a clean line, the way I had taught my agents to do it 20 years earlier. One of the agents, a young woman named Special Agent Mary Donnelly, who had been on my old squad in 2019, knelt beside me in the grass.
Mr. Talmage, you hit? I'm hit, Marray. I'm okay. The taser barbs are in my chest. The shoulder is bruised.
I am not bleeding. Get me sitting up. She helped me sit up. She called for paramedics on her shoulder mic. She kept her hand on my back.
While she was kneeling beside me, the rest of the operation unfolded across the eastern half of Manatee County. At 8:04 a. M., a six agent FBI team arrived at the Vorhees residence at 8 Cypress Point Boulevard. Spencer Vorhees answered the door in a polo shirt and khaki shorts. He was arrested on federal civil rights, RICO, and conspiracy charges.
He did not resist. He asked for an attorney. He was escorted in handcuffs to a bureau vehicle. At 8:06 a. M., a separate four agent FBI team arrived at the Bayou Pines estates HOA office.
Carlen Vorhees was at her desk in a peach blouse and white capri sipping iced coffee from a Yeti tumbler. She was arrested on federal conspiracy, mail fraud, and money laundering charges. She tried twice to call her husband on her cell phone. The phone was by court order seized at the moment of her arrest. At 8:11 a.
M., a tactical team in Sarasota County arrived at Hammock Cove. Two more Sentinel guards on patrol there were arrested. At 8:14 a. M., a third team in Dotto County arrived at Cypress Lakes. Three Sentinel guards were arrested.