Dibee,who was prosecuted in Portland for the crime, doesn’t dispute that he damaged property and must pay restitution but contends the amount of loss calculated by the Bureau of Land Management is inaccurate, his lawyer, Matthew Schindler, wrote to the court.
Dibee targeted the wild horse corral near Litchfield, California, which was part of a BLM project to manage wild herds and prevent overpopulation.
They also set incendiary devices around the property. Only one of the devices ignited, burning down a barn storing hay bales, according to federal prosecutors.
Dibee, now 57, is contesting a BLM letter that broke down the damage and replacement costs. His lawyer argues that Dibee should be responsible only for the damage he caused, not the cost to replace any structures or material.
“It seems incredibly unlikely that the arson burned exactly 250 tons of hay,” Schindler wrote in a brief to the appellate court. “This is an unsworn document where there is no supporting documentation for any of the numbers claimed.”
He will ask the 9th Circuit to throw out the restitution amount and order a U.S. District Courtjudge to hold a new restitution hearing to establish the “amount of the actual loss.” Assistant U.S. Attorney Suzanne Miles, who is the criminal appellate chief in the Oregon U.S. Attorney’s Office, said the restitution should stand.
Prosecutors had sought a higher amount, $122,497.60, based on an itemized statement of losses prepared by a BLM field manager in April 2007, Miles responded in a brief filed with the appellate court. The BLM statement cited $25,000 to replace 250 tons of hay destroyed in the fire, at $100 a ton; $2,099 for the fence panels used to repair fences cut; $3,155 for permanent fence repair and $92,243 for the hay storage pole barn construction. The court had previously ordered two of Dibee’s co-defendants to pay the full amount of $122,497.60.
The BLM had to immediately repair the fences to avoid further risks to horses released and harming motorists at a nearby highway, replace lost hay and rebuild the hay storage barn, according to Miles. The government did concede that the BLM made a double-counting error for some of the repairs but the mistake was fixed.
U.S. District Judge Michael J. McShane then in November 2023 cut the amount of restitution by $40,000 because of “uncertainty” around the hay inventory in the barn and because Dibee had paid $40,000 directly to the victim in a related Oregon arson case.
Dibee fled the country after learning of potential charges in 2005, moved to Syria and later fled to Russia in fall 2010. He lived there until 2018 and was arrested by Cuban authorities on his way back to Russia after a trip to South America. The FBI transported him from Havana to Portland in August 2018.
On Nov. 1, 2022, Dibee was sentenced to time served after he pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit the BLM arson in California in 2001 and to conspiracy to commit arson and arson in an Oregon fire he helped set at the Cavel West Inc. meatpacking plant in Redmond in July 1997. He had spent two years and five months in custodybefore he was sentenced. He was ordered to complete 1,000 hours of community service over three years.
Miles countered that Dibee pleaded guilty to “knowingly and intentionally” conspiring with his co-defendants to “maliciously damage and destroy by fire and explosives” property owned by the BLM. She said the same argument was made in 2023to McShane, who rejected it.