Teen Gets 6 Years as Ringleader of Border Robberies

An 18-year-old war games devotee known as “General Jason” while heading a teen paramilitary group called Metal Militia was sentenced to a six-year prison term Wednesday for his leadership role in a series of robberies of illegal immigrants along the U.S.-Mexico border strip in San Diego.

Jason Joel MacAllister, a slender, curly haired 6-footer whose career goal was to become a U.S. special forces soldier, expressed no visible emotion as Superior Court Judge Frederic L. Link sentenced him for his participation in several border robberies that occurred Aug. 30.

MacAllister was arrested six months after a nationally broadcast television report depicted him and camouflage-outfitted cohorts as they rounded up and questioned undocumented border-jumpers in vigilante style. Those actions eventually led to his expulsion from Mar Vista High School and the disbanding of his group, which was known as the Metal Militia.

While Victor M. Nunez, the deputy district attorney who prosecuted the case, described MacAllister as a “vicious,” remorseless brigand who “preys on helpless individuals,” the defense lawyer, Judy F. Conard, characterized her client as an impressionable, immature follower from a broken, abusive family who eventually got “carried away” with the trappings of military structure.

“I was just to (sic) stupid to realize what I was doing and see the hurt and fear in the people I sined (sic) against,” MacAllister said in a letter reprinted in the county probation report. “Sorry.”

The probation document portrays MacAllister as a troubled, emotionally deprived youth, obsessed with military matters and deeply disquieted by his mixed cultural heritage. (His mother is Latina and his father is Anglo.)

His father, now a resident of Northern California, imparted “a negative attitude toward Hispanics, including his own mother,” the probation report noted. His mother, according to the report, has abused heroin and cocaine, and some of her male companions may have physically and emotionally injured her son.

Neither parent was present for Wednesday’s sentencing.

Three co-defendants, all several years older, have already received sentences ranging from three to six years in state prison. All four entered guilty pleas in connection with the robberies.

In several different attacks during a 10-minute interval, authorities say, the four thieves, dressed in military-style garb, robbed 11 victims of a total of about $170 in cash, assorted rings and bracelets, several packs of cigarettes and identification documents. Victims were told to get down on their knees and place their hands behind their heads. No serious injuries resulted, police said, although several assailants, including MacAllister, carried knives.

“He was the leader of the pack,” Judge Link said of MacAllister, who has no previous criminal record. “He went down into the (border) canyons to rob aliens. He did it several times. He is the most culpable of the group and must be sentenced accordingly.”

The judge ordered the California Youth Authority to determine whether MacAllister, who was 17 at the time the crimes were committed, may be committed to a juvenile facility in lieu of state prison. MacAllister, who has been in custody for almost nine months, is expected to be imprisoned for another two years or so before becoming eligible for parole.

MacAllister first attracted notoriety in February, 1990, when “The Reporters,” Fox Broadcasting’s now-defunct news tabloid program, aired an episode featuring the border exploits of the Metal Militia, highlighting the role of “General Jason.”

The fast-paced, nationally broadcast report, entitled “Human Prey,” featured footage of MacAllister and other youths from the southern San Diego area as they rounded up northbound illegal immigrants in border canyons.

While violent thieves and other hoodlums have long roamed the border strip, authorities say most are hardened Mexican criminals residing in Tijuana--not U.S. teen-agers.

In the furor that followed the broadcast, MacAllister and others charged that the producers coaxed and manipulated the action. Fox stood by the authenticity of its broadcast.

In an interview with the county probation department, MacAllister traces his criminal behavior to a lifetime “fascination” with military matters and a longtime desire to enter the armed forces.

His role model, his attorney noted, is an uncle who serves with the U.S. Green Berets, the legendary special forces unit. MacAllister aspired to follow in his uncle’s footsteps, but was arrested before he could enlist, noted Conard, his lawyer.

As a high school student, the probation report noted, the youth was “almost obsessed” with military matters and war games. He joined a junior officer-training program and eventually became involved with the Metal Militia paramilitary group.

During the two years that the Metal Militia participants were active, MacAllister said, he was “promoted,” and helped recruit a membership that grew to about two dozen young men. “We would dress up and play war,” MacAllister told the probation department interviewer, recalling how he and his friends used string to rig pretend “booby traps” in the border area. “If you hit the string,” MacAllister noted, “you were dead.”

The Fox Broadcasting report thrust MacAllister into the midst of controversy. MacAllister later felt strong resentment from classmates in a school with a large number of Latino pupils.

“All the Mexicans hated us then and the Hispanic students at our school started threatening us,” MacAllister recalled in the probation report, which noted that the tensions eventually led to his expulsion from high school and the end of the Metal Militia.

After leaving school, MacAllister enlisted in May, 1990, in the Job Corps, a federal employment-training program that has its regional offices in Imperial Beach, near the U.S.-Mexico border zone.

Although described by his counselor as a “model student” who was being trained as a nurse, the probation report states that MacAllister and another Job Corp enlistee soon began to launch “war games” forays into the border zone. The four defendants all met at the Job Corps center.

“Then it got more serious and we decided to get some money from the illegals who we would find crossing the border,” MacAllister noted in the interview with probation officials. “Basically, it was still a game,” MacAllister explained, adding that the knives he and his cohorts carried were strictly a “tool” for self-defense. “We didn’t need the money. . . . I realize I was wrong. I don’t know why I didn’t realize it at the time.”