The sheriff of Harney County, Oregon, was contending with armed militants for months before they illegally occupied a national wildlife refuge in January. Sheriff Dave Ward was in Spokane Tuesday at the invitation of the FBI to speak to law enforcement officials about his experiences during the takeover, and Spokane County Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich interviewed Ward for his weekly podcast, “Spokane Talks Online.”  You can read a full report here from S-R reporter Nina Culver.

“It was a very trying time,” Ward said. “I looked over my shoulder during that time more than I did in Afghanistan and Somalia.”

Ward said armed militants followed the sheriff, his deputies and their family members; flooded his dispatch center with complaint calls in an “internet war against us;” drove slowly by deputies’ homes; and followed Ward and his family members in the grocery store and elsewhere. People who put up signs or Facebook pages against the occupiers were harassed and at least one person fled town in fear for his safety, Ward said. The harassment started in November; the occupation came in January.