Authorities Find Weapons Stash In Hermit's Underground Bunker

https://www.foxnews.com/us/milwaukee-weapons-stash-hermits-underground-bunker-woods

Milwaukee authorities find weapons stash in hermit's underground bunker in the woods
By Robert Gearty | Fox News

A Wisconsin man was founding living in an undetected underground bunk in the Milwaukee woods for years with a dog and a stockpile of weapons and ammunition.

Deputies discovered hermit Geoffrey Goff's odd, hidden abode on Wednesday after responding to a call of shots fired.

After entering the 8-foot-by-8-foot bunker - which was also 20-feet-long - the deputies found an arsenal of weapons including two shotguns, a rifle, a handgun, three knives, ammo and a bow with arrows fashioned from “snowplow stakes,” Milwaukee County Sheriff Earnell Lucas said at a news conference Friday.


Mugshot for Geoffrey Graff who was arrested after sheriff’s deputies found a stash of weapons in an underground bunker belonging to him in a secluded, wooded area along the Milwaukee River in Milwaukee. (Milwaukee County Sheriff's Office via AP)

“One would wonder how in an urban setting an individual is able to hide in plain sight,” Lucas said.

Graff, 41, was charged Friday with possession of a shotgun, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

He was also charged with reckless endangerment after admitting that he was the one who fired the shots that deputies were called to check out, according to the paper. Graff said he fired three shots towards the Milwaukee River after his dog ran away.


Photo shows items found in an underground bunker where Geoffrey Graff was arrested after sheriff's deputies found a stash of weapons in the bunker. Officers found the bunker after residents reported shots fired. (Milwaukee County Sheriff's Office via AP)

Lucas said Graff’s bunker also had a grill, propane tanks, a generator, various power tools, boxes of food and canned goods.

“Let’s just be thankful that this didn’t manifest itself in a way, that it could’ve been more. We could be investigating something totally different,” Lucas said.

Graff had constructed the bunker on wooded land along the river that was owned by a local college, Fox 6 Milwaukee reported.

(Milwaukee County Sheriff's Office via AP)" style="-x-ignore: 1">
Photo shows the interior of an underground bunker where Geoffrey Graff was arrested after sheriff’s deputies found a stash of weapons in the bunker.<br> (Milwaukee County Sheriff's Office via AP)

The criminal complaint says Graff had been living there for about seven to ten years, according to the paper.

The station quoted Lucas as saying that investigators had “not been able to find any ideological or political motive for the individual's alleged conduct.”

Court records show a 2012 arrest for scuffling with cops trying to detain him and a 2009 summons for riding a bike down the street with eight German shepherd dogs running alongside, the station reported.

 

Man, if they call that an arsenal I hope they never raid ME!! I have more guns than that in almost every room. I'm not sure what the magazines are for unless the shotgun is magazine fed. There is a sawed-off and cut down single shot shotgun, a sawed down 22 auto rifle??? and one pistol. They made it sound like he was armed to the teeth!

If somebody called the cops every time there were shots fired here there would always be a cop here. I hear gunshots several times a day this time of year and almost every day year round. Once deer season opens there is a lot of shooting and then the duck and squirrels and all the rifles getting sighted in and then just people shooting for the hell of it.

 

"Arsenal" isn't about quantity.
It means just "a collection of weapons, or a place where weapons or stored".

Those are SKS magazines and there's no SKS in the picture.
https://gunmagwarehouse.com/promag-magazine-sks-7-62x39mm-russian-30-round-polymer-black.html

That's the only one I saw that is obviously illegal.
The others look to be long enough. (26" overall)

 

You beat me to it Snyper. They didn't find everything. I wonder how many of these stashes he has.

 

Thanks, I didn't think those were Mossberg 500M mags but I know that they weren't for that cut down 22. The cops may have "collected" the SKS.

 

Caribou and Sniper had same questions as me. Saw no SKS rifle(s). I thought those mags looked like ones used in converted SKS rifles. Thnx for confirming, Snyper.

What the guy has that triggers the BATF is the sawed-off shotgun and the .22 auto with its buttstock sawed off. Barrel on rifle has to be >=16", shotgun >=18". Overall length on rifles has to be >= 26". Wanna get the feds to throw you away for one long time, these puppies are your ticket.

Some "short rifles" are being sold now, however they must be registered as a handgun. Go figure.

I would take the guy into custody so as to get a judge to arrange by court order a 72 hr psych evaluation on him.

Things that raise one's eyebrow:

What exactly was he shooting at? Did he think he had an intruder?

Why was he staying in the bunker? Sounds like this was his place of residence. Doubt he had any ownership on this property area. If public lands are where you intend to permanently set-up, you are going to run into trouble -- camping, OK, permanent residence, no. Sounds like the wooded area was within or adjacent to the Milwaukee city limit. If sane, he'd have had to have known that he was going to be observed and questioned as to his living circumstances -- he's gonna get rousted by the cops, 95% chance.

Was he employed? What manner of income had he? Was he getting a government check? If so, was he disabled? This fellow could be a psych disability case, is what I'm getting at. He may already be known as a person with severe psychological disorders. There's a story here that the public isn't hearing.

Me, I'm thinking he should have been in a hospital or at the very least a halfway-house setting. If he is living in a state of perpetual paranoia, there are med.s to keep him a bit more on this side of psycho-hell. People with schizophrenia suffer mightily. We're talking an absolutely horrific disease.
.

 

Geezer, the SKS comes with an internal 10 round magazine, or rarely a 20 round internal magazine, and is designed to take stripper clips. These are easily converted to use the replaceable duckbill magazines, pictured, by simply removing the internal magazine. This is a simple process and easily reversible. There is also an SKS-M that takes AK magazines.

 

The article said it was a college owned property and that one rifle was found however no rifle was shown in the pics. Maybe a cop liked it and took the rifle. LOL.

You can own an AR15 pistol which really is the same as an AR15 rifle with the exception of a barrel shorter than 16 inches and it can not have a butt stock that can be butted up to your shoulder. This is an AR15 pistol. What looks like a buttstock is actually an arm brace that straps around your forearm.

 

I believe that they are referring to the .22 semi auto with the stock cut into a pistol grip.

 

When a person gets to that point of paranoia that they pull back into a bunker they are real close to being someone that I'm not sure needs guns. I've had dealings with people like that in the past and the thought of one of them with a gun is a little unnerving. When they gt that far along they will start hearing voices telling them things or they will get unable to tell the difference between what they THINK someone is thinking and doing and what they really are doing. The Son of Sam was getting orders from a neighbors dog.

 

The whole point is to keep them from spotting you.

 

It's much harder.

 

I won't say the guy isn't loony but he is industrious. An 8'X20' bunker is a lot of work. It is also something many here would like on their property. Not owning the property and shooting in that area are definitely poor choices. Having a sawed off shotgun when he could have purchased one legally is a really poor choice.

If this guy has been there for 8 or 10 years I'm thinking that he has another bunker as a fallback position.

 

I have a bit of troglodyte in me I guess. I have always found the idea of an underground or cave type of retreat attractive. Along with it being easier to hide, it is fireproof, and you only have a single path of approach to defend. Unfortunately, I was raised and lived in a place that if you dug a hole that was three feet deep by the next day you would have a foot or two of water in the hole. I had never even been in a house with a basement until I was a middleaged man. I think that to some extent this is a genetic leftover from our more primitive ancestors. A house is actually nothing more than a manmade temporary cave. People like walls even if those walls are little more than paper. When our sight distance is limited we "feel" more secure even if it isn't true. We definitely have an instinct to make a den any time we stay in a place for more than a day or two.

 

I'm pretty sure an "above ground cave" doesn't exist anywhere.

And earth-bermed dwelling isn't really a "cave", and would look out of place in many locations.

 

To go back to the OP.
As I see it the real issue is him having recklessly discharged a firearm on land that doesn't belong to him, instead it belongs to a college where other peoples kids go to school.
I think most of us would be rightly concerned if we thought someone trespassing on school or college land was a danger to our kids.

 

Just look at his mug.

Though, I gotta say the media makes it sound as if he was a very, very bad person with guns and shit and likes the taste of human flesh or some shit.

 

Why let the bad guys spot you?

 

Wonder where he got the cash? I mean, what job did he have? I think the sheriff is lucky he didn't go out in a blaze of glory.

 

Repeating it won't change the meaning of the word

No one said it was a requirement.

It's simply easier to hide people and things underground rather than above ground.

 

Admittedly, our boy here may be a little off-center, but he actually lived out a fantasy many of us have had (or still do) about having our own hidey-hole.
Tex, regarding your "Son of Sam" comment.: Although not quite as schizophrenic as what's-his-name, I admit I have been taking secret orders from the voices emanating from a retired RN for about thirty years. The voices don't tell me to kill anyone, but they insist I give them all my money....

 

Yeah, I have had one of those too for 45 years. About 30 years ago though I sent her to college and after that she started paying me. She is a sort of retired Dental Hygenist. She still works one day a week for spending money. It is more fun being the little voice than having it in your ear.