Alleged Leader of Anarchist Group Linked to Homicides Faces New Charges in Maryland

Jack LaSota, 34, faces new misdemeanor gun counts. His anarchist group is linked to killings in California, Vermont, and Pennsylvania.

Jack Lasota. Allegany County Sheriff's Office via AP

The alleged leader of a self-declared “vegan transgender anarchist rationalist” group linked to several homicides faces new indictments in a Maryland court.

Nine gun-related misdemeanor charges were added to the case against Jack Amadeus LaSota, 34, which was elevated from Allegany County District Court to Allegany Circuit Court on March 19. The new charges include carrying concealed and loaded handguns, and possession of an assault weapon. 

Known as “Ziz,” LaSota is considered the central figure and influencer of a cultlike group called the Zizians, who have been linked to homicide investigations in California, Vermont, and Pennsylvania.

LaSota was arrested by Maryland State Police on Feb. 16 along with Michelle Jacqueline Zajko, 32, of Media, Pennsylvania, and Daniel Arthur Blank, 26, of Sacramento, California, after they asked a man in Frostburg if they could park their box trucks and camp on his property. The Associated Press reported that the man called the police and reported three “suspicious” people.

Zajko is facing 14 new gun charges and Blank faces 12 with penalties for each ranging from three months of jail for trespassing to five years in prison for certain gun charges.

Judge Michael Twigg will preside, according to court records.

As previously reported by NTD, sister media of The Epoch Times, all three were charged with trespassing, obstructing, and hindering with a firearm in a vehicle and ordered held without bond on Feb. 18 by District Judge Erich Bean.

Some members of the Zizians have been linked to federal and state homicide investigations involving the death of a landlord in Vallejo, California; a highway killing of a Border Patrol agent in Vermont; and the killing of Zajko’s parents in Pennsylvania.

Court records show that Rita and Richard Zajko were shot and killed in their Chester Heights, Pennsylvania, home on their daughter’s birthday, Dec. 31, in 2022.

NTD has learned that Zajko purchased two guns, which were linked to the Vermont death of Border Patrol agent David Maland in a shootout during a traffic stop in January. The person who was driving the car, Teresa Youngblut, is accused of firing at Maland. Although Youngblut was charged with discharging a firearm, according to the Department of Justice, she has pleaded not guilty to federal firearms charges.

A passenger in the car, Felix Bauckholt, was also killed.

A North Carolina landlord told federal officials that Bauckholt and LaSota had lived together in one of his units and that Youngblut was renting nearby. A marriage license application shows that Youngblut is linked to Maximilian Snyder, who allegedly killed landlord Curtis Lind in Vallejo, California, after Lind had sought to evict LaSota and his associates. Vallejo police arrested Snyder in January and charged him with murder. Although LaSota was not charged at that time, police documented having contact with him at the scene.

Allegany County State’s Attorney James Elliott said at the Feb. 18 bond hearing that LaSota is also the subject of a homicide investigation in Alaska.

LaSota was previously arrested in November 2019 at a rationalist retreat in Northern California’s Sonoma County, along with Emma Borhanian, Gwen Danielson, and Alexander Leatham, after they allegedly blocked a property’s exits in protest of sexual misconduct allegations within rationalist organizations. It was widely reported that LaSota, as a male identifying as female, had become involved in the rationalist movement while living in the San Francisco Bay area.

Authorities discovered blog posts written by LaSota containing comments about anarchism and not eating animal food or animal products.

LaSota once interned at NASA and is a computer programming graduate of the University of Alaska Fairbanks.

The FBI declined to comment and LaSota’s attorney, David Schram, did not respond to requests for comment by publication time.

LaSota is being held on the male side of the county jail, an Allegheny County Detention Center spokesman in Cumberland, Maryland, told NTD.

LaSota’s next court appearance is on April 8, according to a court clerk.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

From NTD News