Arrests shed new light on ‘Zizian’ group tied to multiple homicides, including Minnesotan

A homicide suspect and two other people sought in connection with multiple deaths, including a Vermont U.S. Border Patrol agent from Minnesota, were caught after parking at the end of a remote dirt road in Maryland and asked the property owner if they could live there, court records show.

Maryland police on Monday afternoon arrested Jack “Ziz” Lasota, 34, Michelle Zajko, 32, and Daniel Blank, 26, in a rural area after the property owner called police to report the black-clad suspects on his land. They were collectively armed with a rifle and two handguns, including a loaded pistol tucked into Zajko’s waistband, police said.

“All of the subjects involved are to be questioned regarding other crimes that have occurred across the country,” Master Trooper Brandon Jeffries wrote in an arrest affidavit for the three.

‘It caught up to him’: St. Cloud homicide ends aspiring rapper’s search for a new life

Court records and interviews indicate Lasota is the ideological leader of a small group of highly educated computer experts and vegans who called themselves “Zizians,” lived in box trucks in California and North Carolina and are connected to at least six deaths nationally. Some of the group members are transgender.

The FBI is investigating but has declined to reveal details, and one expert said the group has some hallmarks of a religious cult, with Lasota as a charismatic leader who has inspired seemingly disconnected actions.

“They’re not all necessarily all connected in one overarching plan. It’s not necessarily like a Manson Family-type of plan,” said Mark Pitcavage, a senior research fellow and policy adviser at the Anti-Defamation League’s Center on Extremism. “When you look at his writings, it’s all about the mind and consciousness. He doesn’t really seem interested in left-wing political issues the way most people would understand it.”

Blank is a suspect in the late 2022 shooting deaths of Zajko’s parents in Pennsylvania, and authorities say Lasota and Zajko are being investigated in connection with other multiple deaths nationally, including the Jan. 20 shooting death of a U.S. Border Patrol agent in Vermont.

‘The guy died here’: Slaying rattles neighborhood, raises fears about safety in St. Cloud

Authorities said Zajko may have supplied the guns used in the shootout that ended with the death of Border Patrol agent David Maland and a German national, Ophelia Bauckholt. Arrested in that shooting was Teresa Youngblut, who is jailed and faces charges of using a deadly weapon.

Maland, who grew up in Blue Earth, Minnesota was a veteran of the U.S. Air Force.

A man that Youngblut last year got a license to marry, Max Snyder, is jailed in California on charges that he ambushed and fatally stabbed a landlord who had at one time allowed Lasota and other group members to park their trucks on his property. That landlord killed another member of the group in self defense after they attacked him over a planned eviction, according to court records.

LSD, veganism, high-IQ suspects: Probe of six murders takes feds into strange territory

“These people are educated, good at math. They had this very moral lifestyle, believed reasonable things, and then to just to go off and join a murder gang is just so weird,” said Jessica Taylor, 32, a California-based AI safety researcher who briefly dated Bauckholt and knew several other members of the group.

Court records obtained by USA TODAY show Pennsylvania State Police interviewed Zajko in Vermont in early 2023 after the deaths of her parents, and found her in possession of a legally purchased 9 mm handgun. They did not detain Zajko at that time, but later that month discovered that Zajko’s parents had been shot at close range with a 9 mm pistol and bullets, and that forensics testing indicated the gun Zajko owned could have fired the fatal shots.

Vermont police then returned to search Zajko’s home but found only three 9 mm cartridges but no gun.

In January 2023, Zajko was questioned by Pennsylvania State Police about the deaths of her parents, but her disappeared before being arrested, leaving behind her car and $40,000 in cash, according to court records. The ATF is now seeking federal firearms charges against her.

In the Monday arrest affidavit, Maryland State Police said they found Zajko, Lasota and Blank parked down a dirt road in two trucks with temporary registration plates. Ordered to come out, Blank surrendered quickly, but after “crying, saying not to kill her,” Zajko refused to be handcuffed until officers dropped her to the ground, where they discovered a loaded handgun in her waistband.

All three refused to provide identification or sign arrest paperwork and were identified only after their pictures were shown to an FBI agent, police said.

St. Cloud Times Editor Alice Mannette contributed to this story.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Details emerge in ‘Zizian cult’ killings of Minn. border agent, others