Supporters of the Oregon protesters are claiming that LaVoy Finicum was gunned down in cold blood. FBI surveillance footage tells a different story.

You can see at the 9:18 mark then Finicum exits the vehicle, and then reaches into his pocket, and is shot by the officers at the 9:32 mark.

Here is the FBI statement regarding the footage: 

The video picks up a few seconds before the FBI and OSP vehicles pull in behind the jeep -- the second vehicle in line. The jeep quickly pulls to a stop while the white truck -- driven by LaVoy Finicum -- continues some distance up the road. Some law enforcement vehicles stay with the jeep while others continue following the white truck. Over a period of several minutes out of camera view, the following people exit the jeep without incident: 

*The driver -- who was not charged and will not be named 
*Ammon Bundy 
*Brian Cavalier 

Looking at the white truck... about four minutes into the video ... Ryan Payne exits through a back door. It's difficult to see behind the trees, but in the lower right hand corner you can see him with his hands up being approached by the law enforcement officers and being taken into custody. 

There is a period of approximately 3 minutes and 47 seconds where the truck sits on the road. We have edited it for time here, but it is available in the raw, unedited version on the FBI's YouTube channel. Throughout this time, agents and troopers are providing verbal commands to the occupants to surrender. We can't comment on what may have been going on in the truck at this time, but those details may come out later as part of the overall shooting investigation. When we come back to the video, the white truck leaves the scene at a high rate of speed. It travels some distance... quickly approaching a vehicle roadblock in the roadway. 

As the white truck approaches the roadblock, there is a spike strip across the road but it appears Finicum missed it as he attempted to drive around the roadblock. He nearly hits an FBI agent as he maneuvers to the left. The truck gets stuck in the snowbank. 

Finicum leaves the truck and steps through the snow. Agents and troopers on scene had information that Finicum and others would be armed. On at least two occasions, Finicum reaches his right hand toward a pocket on the left inside portion of his jacket. He did have a loaded 9 mm semi-automatic handgun in that pocket. 

At this time, OSP troopers shot Finicum. 

Approximately 30 seconds after the shooting -- law enforcement officers at the scene deployed flash bangs to disorient any other armed occupants. Shortly after that, they deployed less-lethal sponge projectiles with OC capsules. Those OC capsules would be similar to pepper spray. 

Over a period of several minutes agents and troopers worked to safely remove the remaining truck occupants, and to take them into custody. Those people included: 

*Ryan Bundy 
*Shawna Cox 
*And another woman, who was not arrested and will not be named.

I think that's pretty clear.

This Finicum guy jumps out and puts his hands in his pocket, which was later shown to contain a pistol, and was shot dead.  

Which was clearly the choice that he purposefully made, since there was no way he was going to get out of there without facing jail time.

These guys started this protest for irrational reasons, and they are now facing the very obvious and predictable consequences of those actions.

As far as I'm concerned the survivors should be thanking their lucky stars that all of them are not lying in the snow alongside a road in Oregon.