Artifacts suspect wants to change plea

A Blanding resident who previously pleaded not guilty to accusations of threatening to hurt a key witness in a sweeping illegal artifacts-trafficking investigation wants to change his plea.

Charles Denton Armstrong, 44, is scheduled for a Nov. 20 hearing in Salt Lake City before U.S. District Judge Clark Waddoups.

But that does not necessarily mean Armstrong will plead guilty -- "something we won't know until we actually get to the hearing and see what happens," Melodie Rydalch, spokeswoman for U.S. Attorney for Utah Brett Tolman, said Monday.

Armstrong was to have appeared in court Oct. 16 on a motion to suppress confessions he allegedly gave to federal law enforcement officials and others in Blanding that he would tie an undercover operative to a tree and beat him with a baseball bat. The charge carries a penalty of up to 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

Federal defender L. Clark Donaldson asked for the October delay. Prosecutors, who didn't want to disclose investigative field notes from several federal agents, agreed.

Armstrong, who has an extensive criminal history along with ties to a California white-supremacist gang, drug addiction and mental illness, has been in a Salt Lake County jail since July.

Court papers say Armstrong learned the undercover operator's name from Jeanne Redd, 59, who pleaded guilty to seven felonies in the case. On Sept. 15, Waddoups sentenced her and her daughter Jericca Redd,

37, who pleaded guilty to three felonies, to probation and fines.

Armstrong allegedly blamed the operative for the suicide of Jeanne Redd's husband, James Redd, a Blanding doctor who killed himself by carbon-monoxide poisoning the day after the couple were indicted and their home searched during a June 10 coordinated move against 24 artifact-case suspects.

During a July hearing, Assistant U.S. Attorney Carlie Christensen said Armstrong claimed "he could make one phone call and have the operative taken care of," a reference to his connection to a California prison gang known as the Bakersfield Crew.

Armstrong's court-appointed attorneys responded that Armstrong has had no contact with the Bakersfield Crew since he was paroled in 1989 and owns no guns.

The gang's name is tattooed across the back of Armstrong's neck.