Before He Was a Murderer, J.T. Ready Gave Us a Tour of the Border

When it was reported that a guy named Jason Todd Ready shot four people in Arizona—including a 15-month-old girl—and then himself, our hearts sunk, not just because of the sheer ugliness and horror of the tragedy, but also because we knew J.T. Ready. Or at least, we profiled him as part of a piece on the civilian militias patrolling the US-Mexico border we shot for our MTV show. J.T. was the leader of the “Ready Rangers” a group of self-appointed immigration enforcers who go around the desert with automatic weapons hoping to shoot Mexican drug dealers in the face. It was pretty clear from spending even a short amount of time with the guy that J.T. was a racist, a nutjob, and someone who had delusional fantasies about machine-gunning the bad guys like an action-movie hero. Even so, it’s a pretty big leap from that to actually doing what he did. It’s clear now that the guy had more twisted demons inside him than even the average gun-toting militia member. The cops are still sorting out what events led to the senseless death of four people, but in the next few days, we’re sure the shooting will serve to bring up old debates about Arizona’s incredibly lax gun laws (you can basically own a tank there) and the existence of these militias—if that isn’t already happening.

Watch our piece on J.T. Ready below: