Man who may have helped save lives at Republican convention treated like a turncoat

… by other far leftists who now view him as a “traitor”:

ST. PAUL, Minn. — In a federal courtroom in Minneapolis this month, the public transformation of Brandon Darby of Austin will become complete.

In four years, he has gone from a never-trust-the-government activist to the confidential informant who helped the FBI arrest two Austin men on suspicion of building firebombs during the Republican National Convention in St. Paul in September.

“I feel like, as an activist, I played a direct role in stopping violence,” Darby, 32, said in his first interview on his role.

Darby was the government’s chief informant in the case against David McKay and Bradley Crowder. The two are scheduled to go on trial in U.S. District Court on Jan. 26 on accusations they built Molotov cocktails during the convention. They are being held without bail.

Prosecutors say the two men built the firebombs because they were angry that police had seized a trailer filled with riot shields they had built and hauled to Minnesota.

In a conversation recorded by the FBI, McKay told Darby he planned to use the explosives on law-enforcement cars parked in a lot near the convention site, officials said.

“What if there’s a cop sleeping in the car?” Darby asked McKay, according to an affidavit by Christopher Langert, a special agent in the FBI’s Minneapolis office. “He’ll wake up,” McKay allegedly replied.

McKay also told Darby, “It’s worth it if an officer gets burned or maimed,” the affidavit said.

Darby had been working as an informant since November 2007, almost a year before the GOP convention , and in an e-mail sent to friends Monday, he said he was comfortable with that.

“Like many of you, I do my best to act in good conscience and to do what I believe to be most helpful to the world,” he wrote.

Darby’s admission shocked Austin’s activist community, which includes people who have worked with him on a variety of grass roots organizing efforts for years.

“Everyone that knew Brandon has gone through a whole range of emotions. Clearly, he’s betrayed the trust of the community, and all the communities he’s worked with,” said Lisa Fithian, a social-justice activist who worked with Darby in Austin.

He’s being commended by many on our side of the aisle, but as a result of Darby’s actions, he’ll probably be targeted for the rest of his life by the far left. In fact, Van Helsing notes that a website has been set up to try and shame Darby.

Just goes to show that sometimes doing what’s right is not always doing what’s popular amongst your peers. It clearly wasn’t popular with Darby’s “social justice” pals that he turned against them and, in effect, helped stop something very bad from happening that could have seriously injured – perhaps even killed – multiple people. In the end, he did something we rarely see on the fringes of the far left and the far right: He did the right thing.

Darby’s story is an interesting one. Read a more lengthy article about him here.