A federal grand jury has indicted a Maryland man on charges of making threatening communications to kidnap and injure Cameroon citizens and providing material support to separatist groups, federal prosecutors announced Friday.
Eric Tataw, 38, of Gaithersburg, who allegedly refers to himself as the “Garri master” a term he coined referring to mutilation, ordered violent groups to murder, kidnap and maim civilians in support of the violence separatist fighters use against the Cameroonian government, prosecutors said.
A Cameroonian national, Tataw surrendered and was set to make his initial court appearance on Friday, the department said.
“The defendant is alleged to have ordered horrific acts of violence, including severing limbs, against Cameroonian civilians in support of a violent secessionist movement,” said Matthew Galeotti, head of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, in the release.
Tataw allegedly referred to the dismemberment as “Garriing,” using the phrase “small Garri” for smaller appendages and “large Garri” for limbs or murder, prosecutors said.
He allegedly referred to himself as the “Garri master.”
The separatist fighters, referred to as “Amba Boys,” are calling for the Northwest and Southwest regions to form a new country called “Ambazonia,” prosecutors said. The Amba Boys’ strategies include attacking the Cameroonian military and civilians in efforts to pressure the government into allowing the regions to secede.
The violence in the western regions of Cameroon sparked in 2016, when French-speaking judges and teachers were sent to English-speaking regions, sparking Anglophone demonstrations and protests that Francophones were attempting to reduce their political and cultural significance, according to the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants.
Cameroon inherited two legal systems — English common law and French civil law — following split colonial rule in the early 20th century.
When military forces violently broke up the protests in 2016, the current “Anglophone crisis” began.
The indictment alleges that Tataw began to raise funds in April 2018 to finance the Amba Boys’ attacks in the western regions.
Prosecutors said Tataw, with a large social media following, wrote hundreds of posts across Facebook, YouTube and Twitter calling for the civilian attacks and seeing funds to arm the Amba Boys.
The posts regularly received tens of thousands of views, and the Amba Boys, and Tataw allegedly directed other third parties to circulate the posts further, the department said.
“From about September 2018 through December 2020, Tataw and his co-conspirators raised more than $110,000,” the release stated. “Tataw and co-conspirators transferred portions of these funds — either directly or through intermediaries — to Amba Boys located in Cameroon and neighboring Nigeria.”
Any alleged co-conspirators were not named in the release.
The “National AK Campaign” sought to arm each Amba Boy with an AK-47 rifle in Cameroon, the department said. Prosecutors said funds supplied Amba Boys with explosive materials and items for enforced lockdowns or “ghost-town” orders.
Tataw is alleged to have communicated with the Amba Boy leaders directly, repeatedly taking personal credit for the group’s murders and kidnappings, the release stated.
Tataw allegedly threatened and targeted people he believed were cooperating with the Cameroonian government, such as municipal officials and traditional chiefs, the release stated. Employees of the Cameroon Development Corporation, a public company that grows, processes and sells products like bananas and rubber, were also target, prosecutors said.
Tataw also called for public, educational and cultural properties to be destroyed, according to the release.
“Tataw and his co-conspirators masterminded and financially supported a vicious scheme to overthrow a foreign government,” said U.S. Attorney Kelly O. Hayes for the District of Maryland in the release. “They resorted to an unthinkable level of violence while instilling fear in innocent victims to advance their political agenda.”
Tataw is charged with four counts of interstate communication of a threat to harm and one count of conspiracy to provide material support.
If convicted, he could face a maximum penalty of five years on each count of communication of threat to harm, and up to 15 years on the material support count.
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