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Freight Train Riders of America
The Freight Train Riders of America (FTRA) is a group known for moving around America by freight hopping ("catching out") in railroad cars. They have been particularly active in the northwestern United States.
There are conflicting accounts of the nature of the FTRA, ranging from an informal and loose group of individuals united by lifestyle to accounts of a criminal organization.
The FTRA is sometimes claimed to have been founded by a group of Vietnam veterans in 1984 in a Montana bar. Members of the FTRA claim to be a loosely knit group of people who share a similar lifestyle, and who organise for mutual support. FTRA members mostly frequent the BNSF Railway's Hi-Line, which stretches from Chicago to Seattle, often sleeping in switching yards, bridge underpasses, and boxcars along the route.[citation needed]
An offshoot of the FTRA, known as the Blood Bound Railroad Gang, distinguishes themselves by wearing red bandanas instead of the FTRA's black bandanas.
In 2011, Gus Melonas, a spokesman for the BNSF, said the "FTRA and associated act[s] of riding and living on the rails have gone largely extinct."
Retired Spokane police officer Bob Grandinetti has specialized in investigating the FTRA & FTRC both as a Spokane police officer and since his retirement. He claims members of the group are linked to food stamp and benefit fraud, illegal drug trafficking, and thefts, as well as brutal assaults and murders committed against other transients, vagrants, and the public. These crimes and incidents have been linked to FTRA and FTRC members:
Any categorization of the FTRA as an organization is a loose one at best, due to the inherent transient nature of rail riding. There is no clear count of membership, however that may be defined. This leads to contradictory information about the FTRA as an organized criminal group. Author Richard Grant writes that various FTRA members, including American founder D. Boone, maintain that the group was founded on the basis of camaraderie between people sharing a similar lifestyle, and not as a criminal organization.
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Freight Train Riders of America
The Freight Train Riders of America (FTRA) is a group known for moving around America by freight hopping ("catching out") in railroad cars. They have been particularly active in the northwestern United States.
There are conflicting accounts of the nature of the FTRA, ranging from an informal and loose group of individuals united by lifestyle to accounts of a criminal organization.
The FTRA is sometimes claimed to have been founded by a group of Vietnam veterans in 1984 in a Montana bar. Members of the FTRA claim to be a loosely knit group of people who share a similar lifestyle, and who organise for mutual support. FTRA members mostly frequent the BNSF Railway's Hi-Line, which stretches from Chicago to Seattle, often sleeping in switching yards, bridge underpasses, and boxcars along the route.[citation needed]
An offshoot of the FTRA, known as the Blood Bound Railroad Gang, distinguishes themselves by wearing red bandanas instead of the FTRA's black bandanas.
In 2011, Gus Melonas, a spokesman for the BNSF, said the "FTRA and associated act[s] of riding and living on the rails have gone largely extinct."
Retired Spokane police officer Bob Grandinetti has specialized in investigating the FTRA & FTRC both as a Spokane police officer and since his retirement. He claims members of the group are linked to food stamp and benefit fraud, illegal drug trafficking, and thefts, as well as brutal assaults and murders committed against other transients, vagrants, and the public. These crimes and incidents have been linked to FTRA and FTRC members:
Any categorization of the FTRA as an organization is a loose one at best, due to the inherent transient nature of rail riding. There is no clear count of membership, however that may be defined. This leads to contradictory information about the FTRA as an organized criminal group. Author Richard Grant writes that various FTRA members, including American founder D. Boone, maintain that the group was founded on the basis of camaraderie between people sharing a similar lifestyle, and not as a criminal organization.