On October 11, 2015, the initial Operation Mutual Defense (OMD) Advisory Board (AB) held their first meeting. Each meeting had an agenda and the AB members agreed to record the telephonic meetings, for the record. The recordings were then place in a Dropbox folder, accessible only to the AB members. There was also a private mail-list group set up, again restricted only to AB members.
The AB was comprised of five members. The only member that was known only by one other member, Ryan Payne, was a retired military officer named Dennis Roy Dickenson. Dickenson had endeared himself to Ryan when he was going to fly up to Montana on April 10, 2014. The meeting never occurred, as Ryan had left for the Bundy Ranch on April 7.
