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A Genesee County sheriff's deputy finds an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle with a flash suppressor, telescopic scope and 30-round magazine in the trunk of a car driven by Michael Alan Jones in March 2022. Jones, a suspected member of white supremacist groups including the Proud Boys and Patriot Front, has pleaded guilty to being a felon in possession of a firearm.

The driver tried to assure the sheriff's deputies that he had no firearms, even though he did.

"Is there a gun in the car?" a deputy asked him.

"There shouldn't be," he cryptically answered.

By then, Genesee County deputies had grown suspicious of Michael Alan Jones, a 24-year-old from Charlotte, N.C., whose car they had pulled over on a country road.

On a windy March day, deputies peered into his 2006 Nissan Sentra to find bolt cutters, a box of ammunition, pepper spray, knives, pry bars, a piece of paper featuring the Russian alphabet and compound archery bows.

Jones and his 18-year-old passenger from Fairport gave different versions of how they had met, how long they had known each other and who owned the bows.

With body cameras rolling on March 19, 2022, the deputies pressed the 18-year-old for answers about the car's contents and their travels.

"I plead the Fifth," he said.

After Genesee County sheriff's deputies stopped Michael Alan Jones' car in March 2022, they suspected he had a gun in the vehicle. He denied it.

As they questioned Jones, deputies kept using the word "weird."

Then they found some white supremacist literature in the car. That hinted at secrets Michael Alan Jones was hiding.

Jones’ most recent arrest had been in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 6, 2021 – not for that day's attack on the Capitol but for violating that evening's curfew.

Researchers who track right-wing activists say that Jones has been active in the Patriot Front, which the Anti-Defamation League describes as a white supremacist group whose members spread hateful propaganda.

Internal Patriot Front files leaked to the media collective Unicorn Riot contain a video showing a bearded Jones and other males hanging a Patriot Front banner from a highway overpass in Columbia, S.C.

"He seems to be on a middle rung, almost like a middle manager kind of figure in the group," said Jeff Tischauser, senior research analyst with the Southern Poverty Law Center's Intelligence Project, who has analyzed leaked Patriot Front chats and said Jones chats under the name Adam NC on Discord.

People who join groups like Patriot Front are "very radical," Tischauser said. "They think the system is rigged against white people. They think there is a Jewish conspiracy which is limiting their rights and trying to subvert their culture. If you are joining Patriot Front, if you are joining the Proud Boys ... and definitely if you are joining The Base, you are already a radicalized person."

He theorized that Jones may have been traveling through Genesee County to meet with another member. Both to avoid eavesdropping and to build camaraderie, Patriot Front operatives will drive great distances, Tischauser said.

The federal public defender representing Jones, Steven G. Slawinski of Rochester, said he knows why Jones traveled to the Rochester area. But he wouldn't disclose it.

Jones has not responded to requests for comment from The News.

Michael Alan Jones, of North Carolina, denies he has a rifle in his car after Genesee County sheriff's deputies stopped his vehicle in March 2022.

On the side of School Road in the Town of LeRoy, Genesee County deputies didn't know about Jones' far-right leanings. They had stopped him for an unsafe turn, and in running his North Carolina plates found they belonged on a different car. Video from their body cameras showed that they considered the bolt cutter and pry bars as burglars’ tools. They said they suspected a crime was afoot.

Jones assured deputies nothing in the car was stolen, but he refused to give them permission to open the car's trunk.

Outside of Jones’ earshot, a deputy questioned his passenger. The deputy then falsely told Jones that his passenger had admitted there was a gun in the trunk, and that it was Jones’.

Jones shrugged his shoulders and suggested the teen was just scared.

Because of the switched plates, deputies said they were impounding the car. That meant they could look in the trunk as they made an inventory of the car's contents.

And that's where they found, among other things, handheld radios, meals ready to eat, more knives and the Army Tactical Combat Casualty Care handbook.

Deputy Nicholas Chaumon lifted the lid on a slender cardboard container.

"Is this what you were so concerned about?" he asked Jones.

The deputy gripped an AR-15 that looked almost brand new. Tags were still on it.

Genesee County sheriff's deputies find an AR-15 rifle and 30-round clip in the trunk of Michael Alan Jones' car during a traffic stop in March 2022.

The rifle had a flash hider, a telescopic stock and a removable magazine without a pinned release, meaning it violated the New York SAFE Act banning most semiautomatic rifles.

"It's not NY compliant," Jones volunteered.

But that wasn't Jones’ only problem.

Jones had been convicted in North Carolina in 2019 for a "crime against nature" – having sex with a 15-year-old girl when he was 19.

As a felon, he was prohibited from owning a firearm and ammunition.

Within hours, agents assigned to the Joint Terrorism Task Force were interviewing Jones at the Genesee County Sheriff's Office, the Genesee County records show.

FBI agents interview Michael Alan Jones at the Genesee County Sheriff's Office on March 19, 2022 after Jones was charged with illegally possessing an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle.

An agent, who never gives his name on camera, asked Jones what he was doing in the Batavia area.

"Visiting friends, I guess," Jones said.

"How do you know the friends?"

"No, thank you," Jones responded, then apologized for his refusal to answer, explaining "I would hate to say anything that a lawyer would advise against."

Jones said he didn't drive to upstate New York for any single reason. He said he knows others in the Batavia/Rochester area and has considered moving to New York. Later, when asked if he had a place to stay when released from custody, he said he should be able to find a couch for the night. He refused to identify his friends.

The agent, assuring Jones that his white supremacist propaganda was protected by the First Amendment, asked Jones why he had it. And he asked about the paper with the Russian alphabet. Jones seized on the latter item, saying he wanted to learn Russian. He never addressed the white supremacist writings.

The agent then asked what Jones thought about Antifa, left-wing anti-fascists who oppose white supremacists, occasionally in violent clashes.

"I disagree with their methods and ideology as a whole," he answered. "I’m not crazy fond of them."

The agent asked whether Jones knew of any violent acts or big events being planned for the area.

"I don't believe there are any big things that are going to pop up," he said.

Joint Terrorism Task Force agents ended their interview with Jones after about 45 minutes.

FBI agents later determined that a man Jones had worked with at a Cracker Barrel in Mebane, N.C., had purchased the AR-15 for him online. Jones was charged with being a felon in possession of ammunition and a firearm.

He is no longer facing the curfew violation charge from Jan. 6 in Washington, D.C. That charge was dropped in 2021, according to the Charlotte Observer.

But in December, Jones pleaded guilty in federal court in Rochester to the firearms charge. He agreed not to appeal the conviction if he is sentenced to 24 to 30 months behind bars, 1 to 3 years of supervision after his release and a fine of $10,000 to $95,000.

U.S. District Court Judge David G. Larimer allowed him to return to North Carolina without posting bail. He was scheduled to be sentenced May 15, but it was postponed until Aug. 2.

In court papers, prosecutors and law enforcement agents have made no mention of Jones’ role in the Jan. 6 protests at the Capitol or his involvement in the Patriot Front or any other right-wing extremist groups.

A spokeswoman for the U.S. attorney's office declined to comment when asked about that.

Staff reporter Matthew Spina contributed to this story.

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Watchdog Team editor

I am the editor of The Buffalo News' Watchdog Team. I have worked at The News since 2016. Prior to that I worked for newspapers in Syracuse, N.Y., and in Pottsville, Pa.

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