I was as guilty as others when it came to referring atrocities to Will Grigg. He had his plate full covering the injustices in his little corner of the world. Because of Will, we became aware of the extent of the vile activities of the “punitive priesthood” in his area.  Because of his documentation of his little piece of the Northwest U.S., a reader might conclude that it was filled with a concentrated dose of the most irredeemable jerks in the country. But, as I (and possibly you), became aware of the exact same plunder-funded abuses in my area, I would gleefully shoot off a note to Will Grigg, in a way acting like I had handled the matter by sending it to the Grigg clearinghouse of investigative journalism.

But Will couldn’t handle all of them and he didn’t have a staff of reporters to handle assignments.  I remember informing Will of many such local things, like the ongoing status of a case in my hometown where a Border Patrol Agent used his AR-15 to riddle the body of a youth in Mexico.  I remember informing Will about a now-elderly black man who had been picked up in his early years in Tucson as he stood on the street observing a burning hotel. Without any evidence, the man had his entire life stolen from him. He never got a driver’s license. He never drove a car. He never got married. He was eventually released as an old man after the prosecution failed for decades to address his case despite knowing that there was no evidence against him. I gained some smug satisfaction by telling Will about that case, but I did not drive over to see the man when he was released or before he was released, or conduct an interview.

I shared with Will my personal insights on the Fast and Furious debacle which was occurring right next to me.  I ridiculed the official snow-job occurring in the media, but I did not document it extensively on my own.  I saw others dump things on Will that they should have looked into. His Facebook wall was filled with people informing him of the latest evil deeds occurring in their own home areas.

At best, Will’s regular beat was a mostly rural area covering one percent of the U.S. population. There was no way he could cover the entire country, much less the entire world, with the kind of bold up-close investigative journalism that he deployed.  The very real atrocities in his little area became the focus of many readers and podcast listeners around the world. His was a very real, direct neighborly compassion.  I always thought that if Will ever became entangled in a personal problem with his daring investigative style, I would drop everything and go stand by his side.  As a principled but poor man, he bravely drew a line in the sand and confronted gigantic monsters to help free the oppressed. He would even call out other “libertarians” who “should know better” if they began to advocate pet theft-funded state activities. His last podcast is a testament to that and is worth a listen as a tribute to him. It is on the theft of eminent domain in the construction of a border wall on private lands against the wishes of the property owners.

We could use at least one hundred Will Griggs in the United States alone.

One of Will’s impressive hallmarks was his Christianity. In an age where “Christian” has largely come to mean being a cheerleader for state theft and violence, Will put into practice real Christianity. He believed the teachings in the Sermon on the Mount.  He knew that the source of theft and coercion were the forces aligned against the Prince of Peace.  As he aptly put it towards the end of each podcast, “Let’s send the state back to the hell that spawned it.”

I am so saddened by the loss of Will Grigg. We shared many an insight and I am humbled by the fact that he called me brother. He was my inspiration. He was living proof that there are real selfless people out there.  As Scott Horton put it, he was my hero.  Many thanks for everything brother Will.