ALBANY – A Gloversville man arrested last month on ghost-gun charges and connected to hate groups online has now been charged federally with plotting a bank robbery in Johnstown, according to federal court records.
Luke Kenna, 43, along with a man from Pennsylvania, faces one federal count of conspiracy to commit a bank robbery, records show.
Authorities formally filed the charge last week. Kenna is due in federal court Wednesday afternoon. The existence of the case was first reported Wednesday morning by the Albany Times-Union.
According to an affidavit accompanying the federal criminal complaint, Kenna is accused of plotting with a man named Michael J. Brown, Jr., between Nov. 14 and Nov. 26 to rob the Community National Bank in Johnstown.
Investigators cited electronic communications on Kenna’s cell phone that they said show both Kenna and Brown worked together to further the conspiracy.
The acts included Kenna conducting surveillance on the bank Nov. 21 and Brown traveling from Pennsylvania Nov. 26, according to the affidavit.
The affidavit, completed by an FBI task force officer, describes Kenna as running a self-defense “primitive” survival skills business named Tyr Tactical Training in Gloversville.
The officer notes that Instagram profiles for both Kenna and Tyr “include images consistent with white supremacist ideology, including sonnenrad, pagan symbols/runes, confederate flags, pine tree symbols, and skulls, along with posts showing firearms, edged weapons, and other tactical and survival gear.”
Brown is described in the affidavit as the owner of a business called Black Market Tactical and Black Market Strength and Conditioning, which are believed to provide trainings and sell Brown’s homemade knives.
Kenna and Brown closely associated, according to the affidavit, including co-planning a “Warrior’s Lodge” event in the Adirondacks in October.
On Kenna’s cell phone, seized Nov. 26, investigators found messages that included a group chat that included the worlds “Screenwriters Guild,” also referred to in a message as “the SS screenwriters Guild,” and Brown and Kenna as members of the chat.
The chat included Kenna sending two screenshots of a map showing the route to the North Comrie Avenue bank. It also included further discussions of the plan, according to the affidavit.
At one point, Kenna sent an audio recording indicating he believed law enforcement “might be ‘keeping eyes’ on him,” the affidavit reads. If it became a problem, “we will not abort, we will just change plans. There is no aborting this,” Kenna allegedly said.
After further discussions, Brown wrote “IMO the key to success in this screenplay is demonstrating aggressive domination immediately.”
On Nov. 21, five days before his stop and arrest on the ghost-gun charge, Kenna allegedly sent an audio message to Brown indicating he was planning “a little side thing” at a bar and restaurant he used to work for to “throw some terror into them for payback and also to get some funds up because I’m pretty (expletive) broke. All my money is invested into everything I need for this thing we’re doing and a lot of other things.”
The anticipated time of the restaurant burglary or robbery was that weekend, Nov. 26, the officer wrote in the affidavit.
Investigators soon got a search warrant for Kenna’s residence on Grand Street in Gloversville.
Then, on Nov. 26, a Gloversville officer stopped Kenna. The officer immediately noted to dispatchers that there seemed to be disruptions in radio transmissions, like signals being jammed, the affidavit read. The officer approached and noted he heard his dispatch communications being transmitted over a listening device inside the vehicle had stopped.
Kenna couldn’t provide identification. He wore all black and appeared to be wearing a ballistic vest under his jacket. The officer also saw a large knife and requested backup.
Kenna denied having weapons on him, but a pat frisk discovered a loaded gun and extra magazine in a holster on his waistband, the affidavit reads. Kenna wore a ballistic vest with a knife and he had a radio on his waistband.
Police also found within reach in the vehicle a bag with a loaded six-round magazine, medical equipment for field injuries and a cell phone in a signal-blocking bag, along with knives, scarves and gloves.
Also on the passenger seat, officers found in plain view a notebook with handwritten notes and diary entries.
“Its coming up to the end of the year and I am flat broke with nothing but a gun and a dream,” one of the diary entries reads in part. “I’m going to fulfill my destiny one way or another. And it’s going to take bold action to do so. I have already set in motion a plan to start it all off.”