Marvin Heemeyer: The Killdozer Rampage

 

Marvin John Heemeyer (October 28, 1951 – June 4, 2004) was an American automobile muffler repair shop owner who demolished numerous buildings with a modified bulldozer in Granby, Colorado in 2004.

Heemeyer had various grudges against Granby town officials, neighbors of his muffler shop, the local pres,s, and various other citizens of Granby. Over about eighteen months, Heemeyer had secretly armored a Komatsu D355A bulldozer with layers of steel and concrete.

On Friday, June 4, 2004, Heemeyer used the bulldozer to demolish the Granby town hall, the house of a former mayor, and several other buildings. He killed himself after the bulldozer got stuck in a hardware store he was destroying. No one else was injured or killed, in part due to timely evacuation orders.

Background

Marvin Heemeyer was born on October 28, 1951, on a dairy farm in South Dakota. In 1974, he moved to Colorado because he was stationed at Lowry Air Force Base. In 1989, he moved to Grand Lake, Colorado, about 16 miles (26 km) away from Granby. His friends stated that he had no relatives in the Granby–Grand Lake area.

John Bauldree, a friend of Heemeyer's, said that he was a likable person. Heemeyer's brother Ken stated that he "would bend over backward for anyone". However, while many people described Heemeyer as an affable person, local resident Christie Baker claimed that her husband was threatened by Heemeyer after refusing to pay for a disputed muffler repair. Baker said her husband later paid Heemeyer $124.

Heemeyer enjoyed snowmobiling regularly, doing so with a group of friends. During one trip, a minor avalanche trapped several other sledders, with Heemeyer leading a rescue effort.

Gambling legalization

Heemeyer was strongly in favor of gambling legalization and campaigned for the cause on several occasions. At one point, he began disseminating a newspaper of his own on the issue, as he believed the local newspapers were biased against this cause.

In 1994, a measure was proposed that would have legalized gambling in Grand Lake and Heemeyer was an avid campaigner for it. One reporter, Cece Krewson, said he nearly came to blows with Heemeyer over the matter when discussing it.

Zoning and sewage disputes

In 1992, Heemeyer purchased 2 acres (0.8 ha) of land for $42,000 at auction, to lease to a friend who intended to build an auto repair shop on the site. The land was previously a concrete plant owned by the Docheff family, with Cody Docheff being present at the auction, though he did not intend to purchase the property for himself. Heemeyer later claimed that Cody Docheff had berated him for several minutes afterward out of anger at losing the property, however, no other party present recalled any such interaction.

The property Heemeyer acquired had an inadequate solution to sewage, specifically, putting it in a buried concrete truck barrel, left there by the previous owners. As a result, soon after he acquired the property, Heemeyer contacted the sewer district and asked if he could get a sewage line put into the property. The sewer district agreed to annex the property into the sewer district, but the owner had to put in 100 feet of line and a lift station at their own expense. Paying for the line from the property to the public main line is the standard in the United States. A lift station was required because sewage has to have an open-channel flow. If it does not, the line will become pressurized, leading to overflow. Since the sewage line would run uphill, a lift station is required to prevent the line from becoming pressurized. According to a structural engineer, this would have cost Heemeyer approximately $70,000 to install (excluding electricity costs and maintenance costs). This was nearly twice the cost of Heemeyer's $42,000 purchase of the property to begin with. The sewer district told Heemeyer that putting in a septic tank was a less expensive alternative. He rejected both options and said that the government not paying for the sewage line hookup was "extortion by government fiat". Despite these setbacks, he did not withdraw his annexation request and subsequently became part of the sewer district.

By 1993, Heemeyer had changed his mind regarding the plan to lease and instead opened a muffler repair shop on the property.

In 1997, the Docheff family wanted to expand their concrete business by constructing an in-door concrete batch plant and were buying up the land around their current lot, hoping to lease the remaining 23 parcels to small manufacturers, creating a small commercial-light industrial park. When bringing these plans to the town planning commission, they informed them they needed a "Planned Development Overlay District" permit to construct the plant. The town planning commission also suggested that the Docheff family ask if they could purchase Heemeyer's plot to keep the plant away from the hotels and businesses on Route 40.

Joe Docheff, son of Cody, therefore approached Heemeyer on behalf of the family, to ask if they could buy the land to build an in-door concrete batch plant, as part of Mountain Park Concrete across the road. Heemeyer said he'd sell it for $250,000, with the Docheffs returning several days later to offer this amount. However, according to Susan Docheff, Heemeyer claimed to have had the property appraised, with it now being worth $375,000. It took the Docheffs some time to secure this money, but when they returned with $350,000 Heemeyer claimed another appraisal had raised the value to $450,000. This negotiation happened before the rezoning proposal had a public hearing at the town hall.

Despite not being able to obtain the land, the Docheff family pursued their plans to expand. As part of this, they purchased a defunct commercial subdivision opposite Heemeyer's lot. Heemeyer had attempted to buy this land out from underneath the Docheffs, but was unsuccessful, and later proposed a land swap whereby he would receive a prime lot. This was acceptable to the Docheffs until Heemeyer attempted to demand the Docheffs construct a new building at great expense. The last negotiation meeting before hearings on the plans for the plant began saw Heemeyer flat-out reject any chance of a contract.

Heemeyer had publicly campaigned heavily against the plant in public, attempting to create a movement opposed to it on environmental grounds. Due in part to his canvassing, hearings were initially packed against the plant, with concerns raised about the dust, the noise, and what it would look like. The Docheffs addressed these concerns by promising to install additional measures against dust and noise and presented miniatures of the plant to concerned citizens, with opposition dwindling, though the discovery of a procedural error forced the process of applying to restart. During this process, in November 2000, Heemeyer filed a lawsuit to block the project. Opposition was also dampened, after a town clerk wrote to the local paper arguing that Heemeyer had a vendetta against the Docheffs due to their failure to pay an "exorbitant" price for his property, causing many remaining allies of Heemeyer to abandon his cause.  On January 9th, 2001, the preliminary plans for the plant were approved nearly unanimously, only Heemeyer remained opposed. This made the final approval by Granby's zoning commission and trustees in April a formality.

Heemeyer tried to appeal the decision, claiming the construction blocked access to his shop, which it never did according to the judge handling his case, a local journalist, and people inspecting aerial photography. He also complained to the Environmental Protection Agency, which resulted in the Docheff family having a professional noise analysis done.

In June 2001, Joe Docheff made Heemeyer an offer whereby if Heemeyer dropped the lawsuit, they would provide him an easement to connect a sewer line to the new concrete plant free of charge. Heemeyer just hung up. Around this time, the buried concrete truck barrel that served as Heemeyer's septic tank filled up. Heemeyer responded by pumping his sewage with a gasoline pump into the irrigation ditch that ran behind his property. Heemeyer also attempted to illegally connect to a neighbor's sewer line but was caught and the incident was reported to the sanitation district. At this point, the sewer district started enforcing the legal requirement to have a sewer hookup or a septic tank and fined Heemeyer $2,500 for it and other city code violations at his business, in July 2001, nine years after he was required to have installed either. Heemeyer was found in contempt of town code in November 2001 by the municipal court, and required to fix the connection issues before he could inhabit or use the property for business purposes again, as well as remove the truck barrel before July 2003. Heemeyer agreed before later that day rejecting it, and describing the requirements as a "form of terrorism". An attorney at the judgment reported Heemeyer muttering "I'm just gonna bulldozer this whole place to the ground".

The bulldozer

Planning and construction

After the lawsuit against the town was dismissed in April 2002, Heemeyer blamed the failure on his lawyer and demanded a refund. Knowing the zoning decision was now final, he traveled to California, bought a Komatsu bulldozer in an auction for $16,000, and had it shipped to Granby in July 2002. He kept it outside of his business with a For Sale sign on it and tried to auction it, but few paid it any mind. In October 2002, he announced the closure of the muffler repair business, putting almost the entire inventory up for sale. When the bulldozer failed to sell, he saw it as a sign from God he had to start his mission. He sold his property for $400,000 (~10x the original purchase price) to The Trash Co. in October 2003, and took out a lease for half the building he previously owned until he had "finished some work". Within a day of the purchase closing, the new owners had completed water and sewer connections.

He erected a wall to separate his space from the rest of the building and changed the locks. While no one in Granby saw him, he quietly worked on the bulldozer, illegally constructing living quarters to avoid having to return to his home in Grand Lake, which he saw as a waste of time that could be spent on the dozer. During this period, he dumped his sewage into the same irrigation ditch he had been caught dumping into several months earlier.

"It is interesting to observe that I was never caught", Heemeyer wrote. "This was a part-time project over 1½ years." He was surprised that several men, who had visited the shed late the previous year, had not noticed the modified bulldozer ", especially with the 2,000-pound [910 kg] lift fully exposed ... somehow their vision was clouded".

During this period, Heemeyer repeatedly mentioned the bulldozer to friends and associates, as well as his intention to use it for destructive purposes.

Specifications

The bulldozer was a modified Komatsu D355A, which he referred to as the "MK Tank" (or "Marv's Komatsu Tank") in audio recordings, fitted with makeshift armor plating covering the cabin, engine, and parts of the tracks. In places, this armor was over 1 foot (30 cm) thick, consisting of 5,000 psi (34 MPa) Quikrete concrete mix sandwiched between sheets of ½-inch (1.3 cm) tool steel (acquired from an automotive dealer in Denver), to make ad-hoc composite armor. This made the machine impervious to small arms fire and resistant to explosives. Three external explosions and more than 200 rounds of ammunition fired at the bulldozer had no effect on it.

For visibility, the bulldozer was fitted with several video cameras linked to two monitors mounted on the vehicle's dashboard. The cameras were protected on the outside by 3-inch (76 mm) shields of clear bulletproof Lexan. Compressed-air nozzles were fitted to blow dust away from the video cameras.

Onboard fans and an air conditioner were used to keep Heemeyer cool while driving. He had made three gun ports, fitted for a .50 caliber rifle, a .308 caliber semi-automatic rifle, and a .22 caliber rifle, all fitted with a ½-inch (1.3 cm) steel plate.

At the time of the demolition, it also contained three handguns and enough food and water to last a week.

Demolition and assault

On June 4, 2004, starting at around 2:15 p.m., Heemeyer began his rampage by driving his armored bulldozer through Mountain Park Concrete, owned by the Docheff family. At the time of the attack, Cody Docheff was at the concrete plant, screening topsoil at the gravel pit, when he got a notification over his radio that there was an explosion at the precast shop. Several employees attempted to stop the bulldozer, by cramming objects into the treads to jam it, to no effect. Cody Docheff, initially believing the dozer to be under remote control, fired a pistol at it, and attempted to climb on top, to no effect, before engaging the bulldozer with his own front-end loader, again to no success. During this time, Heemeyer fired multiple rounds at the loader. A deputy from the sheriff’s office arrived on the scene, followed by a Colorado State Patrol Trooper, who was fired upon by Heemeyer. More sheriffs arrived, and began firing on the dozer, attempting to destroy the cameras with gunfire, but were unable to penetrate the 3-inch (7.6 cm) bulletproof plastic. At one point, Heemeyer charged at a firing position occupied by several state troopers, who evacuated mere seconds before he demolished it, with one eyewitness noting that had they taken any longer they would have been killed.

After the concrete plant, Heemeyer turned onto Agate Avenue and headed south toward town at approximately 5mph. The officers at the plant requested a reverse 911 call be made to all residents, to initiate evacuations. Undersheriff Glenn Trainer climbed atop the bulldozer and rode it "like a bronc buster, trying to figure out a way to get a bullet inside the dragon". He also dropped a flash-bang grenade down the bulldozer's exhaust pipe, with no apparent effect, and was later forced to jump down to avoid debris.

Heemeyer then advanced on Granby Town Hall, which had been hosting a story hour for children in its library when the rampage began. All occupants were only evacuated moments before Heemeyer reached the building, an hour after the rampage began. Heemeyer turned to the Liberty Savings Bank, where he aimed at the corner office where a woman who was a part of the zoning board worked.

Police forces were unable to damage the bulldozer, and so instead resorted to following the dozer, jogging alongside it en masse. Heemeyer next targeted several street fixtures, such as trees and traffic lights, before moving on to the offices of the local newspaper, and in turn the homes of the Thompson family, and their workplace. A scraper was brought up to try and stop the bulldozer, but it was pushed aside.

Heemeyer next targeted a propane storage yard, firing fifteen bullets at the tanks, some of which contained 30,000 gallons. Police were forced to hurriedly evacuate all residents within a thousand yards of the site, including a senior housing complex. Heemeyer then fired upon nearby power transformers, with a high risk of igniting the tanks, but struggled to find a good angle. Heemeyer hit the Transformers once and missed his other shots. "Had these tanks ruptured and exploded, anyone within one-half mile (800 m) of the explosion could have been endangered", the sheriff's department said. Twelve police officers and residents of a senior citizens complex were within such a range. After leaving, he was engaged by another scraper, which he similarly defeated.

At this point, local authorities and the Colorado State Patrol feared they were running out of options in terms of firepower, as the approximately 200 rounds fired by police had been ineffective up to that point, and that Heemeyer would soon turn against civilians in Granby. Governor Bill Owens allegedly considered authorizing the National Guard to use either an Apache attack helicopter equipped with a Hellfire missile or a two-man fire team equipped with a Javelin anti-tank missile to destroy the bulldozer. As late as 2011, Governor Owens's staff vehemently denied considering such a course of action. Members of the State Patrol, however, claim that to the contrary, the governor did consider authorizing an attack, but ultimately decided against it due to the potential collateral damage of a missile strike in the heart of Granby being significantly higher than what Heemeyer could have caused with his bulldozer.

Heemeyer finally attacked the Gambles Store, targeting it due to the owner's involvement in the hearings about the batch plant. Unaware of a small basement on the property, Heemeyer drove in and dropped a tread into the basement. The radiator had been damaged, and the engine was leaking, before failing. it was noted that, even had Heemeyer been able to free himself, the bulldozer would not have been able to operate much longer. About a minute later, at 16:30 MST, one of the SWAT team members, who had swarmed around the machine, reported hearing a single gunshot from inside the cab. It was later determined that Heemeyer had shot himself in the head with a .357-caliber handgun.

Police first used explosives in an attempt to remove the steel plates and for fear of booby-traps, but after the third explosion failed, they cut through them with an oxyacetylene cutting torch. After getting inside, they found the access hatch and enough food and water to last a week. Grand County Emergency Management Director Jim Holahan stated that authorities were able to access and remove Heemeyer's body at 2 a.m. the next day, on June 5.

Aftermath

The attack lasted two hours and seven minutes, damaging thirteen buildings, eleven of which were occupied until moments before their destruction. His targets included the town hall, the Sky-Hi newspaper office, Gambles General Store, Maple Street Builders, Mountain Parks Electric Co, Liberty Savings Bank, Kopy Kat Graphics, the wall of his former business, the home of a former mayor (in which the mayor's 82-year-old widow then resided), and a hardware store owned by another man Heemeyer named in a lawsuit, as well as a few others. The rampage knocked out natural gas service to the town hall and the concrete plant, damaged a truck, and destroyed part of a utility service center. As part of the rampage, Heemeyer destroyed several trees outside a local business, which the owner had previously claimed were hurting his business.  The damage was estimated at $7 million, $2 million of which was to the concrete plant, which was underinsured, resulting in a payout of $700,000.

Many town records and archives were destroyed along with the town hall.

Defenders of Heemeyer said that he made a point of not hurting anybody during his bulldozer rampage. Ian Daugherty, a bakery owner, said Heemeyer "went out of his way" not to harm anyone. Cody Docheff stated that "if Heemeyer truly didn’t want to hurt anybody, he would have plundered the center of town on the weekend when most businesses would have been empty". The sheriff's department said that the fact that no one was injured was not due to good intent as much as to good luck.

On April 19, 2005, the town announced plans to scrap Heemeyer's bulldozer. The plan involved dispersing individual pieces to many separate scrap yards to prevent souvenir-taking.

Although no one other than Heemeyer was killed in the incident, the modified bulldozer has occasionally been referred to as the "Killdozer". It is unclear whether this is an allusion to the 1944 short story "Killdozer!" or its 1974 film adaptation, or if this is independent coinage.

In recent years, Heemeyer gained a small internet following for his bulldozer attack, comparable to the Unabomber's following in the same or similar communities, with people politicizing and justifying his actions as reasonable and proportional. An example of such a group is the Boogaloo Boys.

Motivation

Investigators later found Heemeyer's handwritten list of targets of 107 people who he thought had wronged him. The Docheff family was at the top of the list (written as "Douche-eff"). The list also included various buildings, companies, judges, politicians, newspaper editors, and anyone who sided against him in past disputes. One entrant was the local Catholic Church (which he did not damage), due to their opposition to his attempts to legalize gambling, as well as theological differences as Heemeyer was a member of the Christian Reformed Church.

Before the rampage, Heemeyer had scrawled a list of complaints onto an old For Sale sign, as well as scrap paper. These ranged from the Docheffs' unwillingness to pay the large sums he requested, the sanitation district's fining of him, and that the town had approved the plant construction. The other writings suggested that God had stopped the plant from being constructed in 1992, and alluded to a belief that God had caused the deaths of multiple people who had opposed him. Heemeyer further claimed that "I was always willing to be reasonable until I had to be unreasonable", adding that "Sometimes reasonable men must do unreasonable things."

In addition to these writings, Heemeyer recorded three audio tapes explaining his motivation for the attack. The tapes contained two separate recordings on each side for a total of six recordings. He mailed these to his brother in South Dakota shortly before stepping into his bulldozer. Heemeyer's brother turned the tapes over to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), who in turn sent them to the Grand County Sheriff's Department. The tapes are about 2.5 hours in length. The first recording was made on April 13, 2004. The last recording was made on May 22, thirteen days before the rampage.

"God built me for this job", Heemeyer said in the first recording. He also said it was God's plan that he not be married or have a family so that he could be in a position to carry out such an attack. "I think God will bless me to get the machine done, to drive it, to do the stuff that I have to do", he said. "God blessed me in advance for the task that I am about to undertake. It is my duty. God has asked me to do this. It's a cross that I am going to carry and I'm carrying it in God's name."

Other statements included in the tapes make mention of Heemeyer's view that he was an "American Patriot", with local journalist Patrick Brower suggesting this may be indicative of links to the broader Patriot movement.

In popular culture

Leviathan (2014 film) – a Russian film inspired by Heemeyer's story

Tread (film) – a 2019 documentary film based on the rampage