On the June day when Cirino Gonzalez learned that U.S. marshals and police SWAT teams were surrounding the fortress-like home he'd sworn to protect, he called his father in Texas.

Gonzalez, who goes by the nickname Reno, had spent nearly two months living in the Plainfield home of Ed and Elaine Brown, a retired exterminator and dentist who have been convicted of multiple tax-related offenses but have refused to surrender to authorities. Gonzalez joined the Browns a few months after he returned from Iraq, where he worked as a military contractor. He made the couple and their anti-tax views his cause, vowing to die in their defense if necessary.

Jose Gonzalez had listened as his son shared newly-acquired anti-government views. He had given his blessing when Reno left to go help the Browns. He read his son's blog, and learned when he'd bought a military sniper rifle. After learning about the newly-intensified danger, Gonzalez decided to join his son in Plainfield.

Reno Gonzalez was one of four core Brown supporters who were arrested by marshals last week in a multi-state sweep, and charged with federal felonies for helping the tax-protesting couple. Three of the four men had family members who shared their deep commitment to their ideological cause. Jose Gonzalez, who is studying to become a family counselor, has been saddened by his son's detention but is also enraged by his arrest. He believes, like his son and the Browns, that government officials are conspiring to keep the truth about the federal income tax from ordinary Americans.

"We're doing this because we want to inform the American public that there is no law requiring Americans to pay a federal income tax and therefore all this coercion that the IRS and the federal marshals have practiced on American citizens amounts to terrorism," Jose Gonzalez said in an interview shortly after his son's arrest.

In online videos, blog posts, interviews and court records, a picture of the support system for the Browns' supporters becomes clear. Gonzalez, Danny Riley and Robert Wolffe all had family members who stood firmly behind them, embracing their political views and lionizing the Browns. Fewer details have emerged about the family of the fourth man, Jason Gerhard.
'A truth movement'

Jose Gonzalez, 48, said he came to share his son's view about the income tax readily. Both Gonzalezes were upset about the war in Iraq, but felt their war protests were having little impact on the conflict. When Reno told Jose that income taxes were a fraud, Jose Gonzalez said he was heartened, even though he personally earns so little that he does not pay any income taxes.

"We are part of a movement - we call ourselves a truth movement. That is the bigger picture. The real picture is Cirino and I are trying to bring the war in Iraq to an end. Demonstrating with billboards on the street didn't work. Calling our congressman didn't work," he said. "When we figured out this is what's feeding the war machine - we've got to stop the food - this is how we got involved with Ed and Elaine."

Reno Gonzalez packed his subcompact car and drove to Plainfield in April, bringing weapons with him. Once he arrived, he offered the Browns his military training and advised them on security. He also posted frequent, sometimes incoherent updates on their MySpace blog, describing visitors to the house and his own evolving political views.

When he purchased a high-powered .50-caliber sniper rifle in late April, he wrote a post celebrating his new weapon. "I get sad knowing not everyone has one," he wrote.

Jose Gonzalez said his son's venture forced him to go online. He did research on "patriot" themed websites and established his own MySpace page, which is now filled with tax protest theories and videos. Jose Gonzalez said he had concerns about the Browns from the beginning. As he describes it, he had hoped to find a more appropriate "Rosa Parks" for the tax protest movement. But he said he was persuaded by his son that the Browns' wealth, celebrity and willingness to die for their cause made their case an unusual opportunity to bring attention to their anti-tax views.

Jose Gonzalez brought along his son Romeo, a police officer in Texas, and he nearly lost his job after the local paper ran an article highlighting Jose Gonzalez's own military experience working with chemical, biological and nuclear weapons. The Gonzalez family did not stay at the Browns' home long. According to a blog post, Jose Gonzalez and Ed Brown clashed nearly immediately, after the father and son suggested security measures for the house that Ed Brown rejected. Now, Gonzalez describes Ed Brown as a racist with political ambitions, but he still believes the Browns are the best vehicle for spreading the truth.

"We cannot be picky about who's going to help us topple the IRS," Jose Gonzalez said. "After this cause is done, we will choose another cause and focus on it."

Regular visitors

Robert and Valeri Wolffe knew the Browns long before their recent clash with authorities. Robert Wolffe and Ed Brown were both leaders in the U.S. Constitution Rangers, a national anti-government organization, which Brown has described as responsible for holding law enforcement officials accountable for constitutional violations.

According to court documents, the Wolffes, who lived in nearby Randolph, Vermont, visited the Browns regularly since they began their standoff, frequently towing their camper along so they could spend nights on the property. They loaned the Browns a car, prosecutors alleged, and offered their home as a transfer point for supplies after the marshals cut off mail delivery to the Browns' home.

Like the Browns, who had 30 weapons in their home at the time of their arrest last May, the Wolffes owned a variety of guns, including assault rifles. Prosecutors allege that Ed Brown and Robert Wolffe would shoot guns together on the property when Wolffe visited.

Valeri Wolffe was not a member of the Constitution Rangers, but her allegiance to her husband's views became clear after his arrest. After marshals visited her home, she immediately called the host of a "patriot" radio station to ask for advice. Following his recommendation, she swiftly packed two suitcases with clothes for her and her husband and moved all their weapons into the rear hatch of her SUV, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Arnold Huftalen at a court hearing Monday.

When investigators returned with a search warrant for the house, the weapons were gone. Valeri Wolffe ultimately led them to the car, which contained rifles and handguns, boxes of ammunition, noise protection earmuffs and the suitcases, the prosecutor said. Huftalen focused on the earmuffs as evidence that Wolffe was not merely hiding her guns, but packing them with intent to use them.

Lawyers also disclosed this week that Valeri Wolffe videotaped a conversation between her husband and an investigator. Wolffe's lawyer said he planned to use the tape as evidence that the government had "totally misconstrued" the nature of Wolffe's statements, but he abruptly decided to abandon his argument before the video could be shown.

A search of Valeri Wolffe's workplace found further evidence of her ideological orientation. On her computer at the U.S. Department of Transportation, Huftalen said, investigators found a document that he said "could best be described as a manual on how to kill federal agents."

She has attended both of her husband's court hearings since his arrest, but has refused to speak with reporters.

'A life cycle'

Watchers of extremist groups said that it's not unusual for family members to sympathize with a relative's tax protesting or militia membership. Families often share values that may underlie their interest in the movement. But it's also common for fringe views to splinter a family, especially when those views begin to have consequences.

"Usually, what you see is kind of a life cycle of a tax protester. A husband gets involved, husband gets excited and wife doesn't really pay attention. But a little later on, wife really has to pay attention as notices come in from the IRS," said J.J. MacNab, a tax evasion expert who is writing a book on the tax protest movement. "Usually what you see in the life cycle is it ends in a divorce."

But when families or close groups all embrace the same ideology, their solidarity can become a strong force against outside influence.

"Once you're in a group that has views that are outside the mainstream, you develop a sense of being the truth tellers against the false information in the outside world, and that binds you even closer to the group," said Chip Berlet, who studies the psychology of conspiracy theories, and who interviewed Ed Brown several times in the 1990s for a book. "The more people dismiss you, the more you're convinced you're right."

'They're true patriots'

Daniel Riley, an electrician from Cohoes, N.Y., lived in the home of his father, a retired state worker. Riley was charged with four felonies last week, and he is accused of helping the Browns install motion-sensing lights and fire extinguishers and bringing them weapons.

Riley became involved with the Browns this spring but became famous among their supporters in June. He was briefly detained by marshals after stumbling upon a surveillance team while walking the Browns' dog near the Browns' driveway. In the days and weeks after the incident, Riley told various versions of the story. In each, he claimed he'd been shot at and Tasered by marshals.

That alleged assault fueled the sympathy of Riley's 73-year-old father, who described on a long video interview how he felt his son has been mistreated by authorities. He compared the marshals' recent arrest of Daniel Riley with the actions of Nazi Storm Troopers in World War II.

"I can't understand why they're treating him (this way) - it hasn't deterred him from going up to Ed Brown's. He'll go up there and support him any day," he said on the video. "They're true patriots. They're my heroes."

As he weeps on the video, Bill Riley proudly holds up a photograph of his son posing with Ed Brown and Randy Weaver, who survived the deadly Ruby Ridge standoff with marshals in 1992 and visited the Browns this summer. "I back my son, 100 percent. I'm proud of him," he said.

Daniel Riley's brother, also named Bill Riley, drove from Albany to attend his brother's detention hearing this week, but said little to reporters. He also appeared in the internet video, interviewing his father.

Shared distrust

The strong family support the three men have received could hurt them, experts say, because it may embolden them to continue fighting the system, even if cooperating would be in their best interest.

"My experience has been that when the families are all in it and all supportive of an extreme position, it does tend to reinforce intransigence," said Mark Pitcavage, the director of fact finding at the Anti-Defamation League, which tracks tax protest and militia groups. "So it could theoretically tend to make their situation worse."

MacNab agreed that family support for the Browns' allies is unlikely to help their cases, because they all share a distrust for the federal government and the court system.

"If the family is supportive, chances are the defendant is going to fight rather than work with his attorney. If the family's saying, 'You are a hero, you went and defended Ed Brown,' you are less likely to cut a deal," she said. "And the evidence in this case appears to be pretty straightforward."