Trial consolidation reset for ‘Zizians’ charged with a 2022 Bay Area killing
A Solano County Superior Court judge on Friday rescheduled proceedings for two followers of the cult-like Zizian group who are charged with a November 2022 murder and attempted murder in Vallejo.
After conferring with attorneys in Department 22 in Fairfield, Judge John B. Ellis ordered Suri Dao, 23, and Alexander Jeffrey Leatham, 29, to return at 9 a.m. April 8 for a “conditional exam,” a trial setting, the setting of a motion to amend the criminal complaint, and to consolidate the pending trial.
The scheduled 1:30 p.m. afternoon hearing in the Hall of Justice, delayed until 2:05 p.m. when an in-chambers meeting with Ellis ended, was marked by an outburst by Leatham, a transgender woman, who, shackled and clad in a jail jumpsuit, shouted several times in a high-pitched voice and repeated unintelligible expressions except for clear references to “the people.”
Referring to Leatham as “Ms. Leatham,” Ellis advised her to refrain from outbursts if she wanted to be seated in the courtroom. When she continued to shout, Ellis ordered a bailiff to place her in a side room with a window, allowing her to see and hear the proceedings.
Solano County Alternate Defender Carol Long represented Leatham, and San Francisco-based attorney Brian Ford represented Dao, a prison inmate who appeared via a remote video feed.
Long told the judge that she had not yet received all the documents in the case needed for her to be ready for trial. Ford also said he needed more documents in the case to prepare an adequate defense.
Prosecutors filed the case Nov. 15, 2022, two days after they allege Dao and Leatham attempted to kill Curtis Lind in Vallejo. Lind shot two of his attackers that day, wounding one and killing 31-year-old Emma Borhanian, court records indicate.
The DA’s complaint charges Dao and Leatham for Borhanian’s death; the attempted murder of Lind; and and aggravated mayhem while using a knife, or sword, to attack and injure Lind. The charges are coupled with several enhancements, including great bodily injury on a victim 70 years or older, and inflicting great bodily injury or using a firearm.
Deputy District Attorney Ilana Shapiro, who leads the prosecution, filed an amended complaint on March 5, citing “allegations and aggravating factors,” including references to any crimes previously committed by the defendants, which may affect sentencing.
The trial, whenever it is scheduled, is expected to take five weeks, court records show.
The case took a unexpected turn two months ago, when fellow Zizian Maximilian Snyder, 22, of Washington state, is accused of killing Lind, 82, on Jan. 17 at his property in Vallejo. He was set to testify in the pending trial for Dao and Leatham.
Snyder has pleaded not guilty and is scheduled for further arraignment at 8:30 a.m. March 26 in Department 23 in the Justice Building in Vallejo. He is represented by Vallejo attorney Terry A. Ray.
The Zizians are linked to six deaths across the U.S., including the killing of a U.S. Border Patrol agent, the Associated Press reported last month.
In the wooded outskirts of Chapel Hill, North Carolina, a perplexed landlord noticed odd sights at two of his rental properties.
Tenants wore long black coats and parked box trucks outside the duplexes. They ran an electrical cord from one box truck into one of the condos, and kept a stretcher inside another.
A neighbor remembers similarly dressed figures walking around at night holding hands. They never spoke a word.
By the time the FBI searched the property in February, one of the most recent tenants had been killed in a shootout with U.S. Border Patrol agents in Vermont, and a second was under arrest. A third, a shadowy figure known online as “Ziz,” remained missing for after authorities linked their cultlike group to six deaths in three states.
Officials have offered few details of the cross-country investigation, which broke open after the Jan. 20 shooting death of a Border Patrol trooper in Vermont during a traffic stop. Associated Press interviews and a review of court records and online postings tell the story of how a group of young, highly intelligent computer scientists, most of them in their 20s and 30s, met online, shared anarchist beliefs, and became increasingly violent.
Their goals aren’t clear, but online writings span topics from radical veganism and gender identity to artificial intelligence.
At the middle of it all is “Ziz,” who appears to be the leader of the strange group, who called themselves “Zizians.” She has been seen near multiple crime scenes and has connections to various suspects.
She was even declared dead for a time, before reappearing amid more violence.
Who is Ziz?
Jack LaSota moved to the San Francisco Bay area after earning a computer science degree from the University of Alaska Fairbanks in 2013 and interning at NASA, according to a profile on a hiring site for programmers, coders and other freelance workers. NASA officials did not respond to a request to confirm LaSota’s internship, but a Jack LaSota is listed on a website about past interns.
In 2016, she began publishing a dark and rambling blog under the name Ziz, describing her theory that the two hemispheres of the brain could hold separate values and genders and “often desire to kill each other.”
LaSota used she/her pronouns, and in her writings says she is a transgender woman. She railed against perceived enemies, including so-called rationalist groups, which operate mostly online and seek to understand human cognition through reason and knowledge. Some are concerned with the potential dangers of artificial intelligence.
LaSota began promoting an extreme mix of rationalism, ethical veganism, anarchism and other value systems, said Jessica Taylor, an AI researcher who met LaSota both in person and online through the rationalist community and knew her as Ziz.
When LaSota left the rationalists behind, she took with her a group of “extremely vulnerable and isolated” followers, Anna Salamon, executive director of the Center for Applied Rationality, told the San Francisco Chronicle.
Taylor said Ziz adherents use the rationalist ideology as a reason to commit violence. “Stuff like, thinking it’s reasonable to avoid paying rent and defend oneself from being evicted,” she said.
LaSota, 34, has not responded to multiple Associated Press emails in recent weeks, and her attorney Daniel McGarrigle declined to comment when asked whether she is connected to any of the deaths. She has missed court appearances in two states, and bench warrants have been issued for her arrest. Associated Press reporters have left numerous phone and e-mail messages with LaSota’s family and received no response.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.