Alaska Peacekeeper Militia Leader, 28-year-old Schaffer Cox was sentenced in U.S. District Court yesterday during a hearing in Anchorage.

A visibly upset Cox said that “I put myself here, with my own words.” He went on to say in court, “And I feel horrible about that. And I hurt my family, and that’s who is really paying.” Cox stated that he had scared a lot of people with his statements and said that much that he said was crazy and horrible, he told the court, “I couldn’t have sounded any worse if I tried. The more scared I got, the crazier the stuff,” he said. “I wasn’t thinking, I was panicking.” He also apologized to his wife and children. His tone in court was much milder than his stance in earlier court appearances where he appeared arrogant and uncooperative.

This new approach in this hearing didn’t sway the court however, and his lengthy sentence was meted out by Judge Robert Bryan. Cox and his atorney cited a post-trial mental evaluation that said Cox suffered from paranoid schizophrenia, delusions and a paranoid personality disorder. The Judge agreed that Cox was probably mentally ill but said that even that did not excuse his actions. Judge Bryan said, “I want to note that he has never been so ill as to not be able to have followers and convince people to follow him.”

Cox received the same sentence as his foot-soldier, Lonnie Vernon, who was sentenced on Monday. Cox received nearly 26 years for his part in a plot to kill government agents.

Cox would come on to the government’s radar in 2009 while in Montana. In that state, he had made speeches vastly overstating the strength of his Fairbanks militia. In speeches, he told his audience that he had 3,500 heavily armed militiamen ready for action. In reality, Cox commanded a sparse 12 members. But, the speeches put government agents on his trail. An informant was slipped into the group and that man would amass over 100 hours of incriminating tape of conversations held by the militia.

It wasn’t until the group, under Cox, formulated a plan to kill two law enforcement officials for every one militia member and began to collect more arsenal that it was determined that he had crossed the line and the federal government moved to curtail his activities. The plan was called by the group, the “241 Plan” or “2 for 1 Plan.” Cox was arrested in 2011 for his involvement in the “241 Plan.”

Prior to his legal problems, Cox ran for the House District 7 seat of the Alaska Legislature against Representative Mike Kelly, where he captured 37% of the vote in the Fairbanks primary.