Two men seen walking rural roads in Florida with an AR-15 described themselves as “Second Amendment monitors,” according to the Holmes County Sheriff’s Office.
Holmes County Sheriff’s Office photo
A man seen walking West Florida roads in body armor and carrying an AR-15 says he is a “Second Amendment auditor,” according to investigators in the Panhandle.
The man, who is accompanied by a cameraman, was first reported near the Holmes County Jail in Bonifay, the Holmes County Sheriff’s Office said in an Oct. 7 news release.
The Second Amendment of the Constitution protects the right of U.S. citizens to keep and bear arms.
“Deputies are on scene monitoring their activity. The individuals are acting as Second Amendment auditors, whose intent appears to be to record law enforcement and provoke a response,” the sheriff’s office said.
“Deputies are maintaining a professional presence and ensuring that all actions remain lawful and that public safety is maintained. At this time, there is no active threat to the community.”
The identities of the two men were not released.
In an update, the sheriff’s office noted the men had become aware they were being watched and filed a grievance. However, the sheriff’s office has refused to back off, noting its commitment to protecting citizens’ rights includes public safety.
“The ‘gunslingers’ didn’t get the response they wanted and are now calling to complain that a deputy is harassing them because they’re being followed,” the sheriff’s office said.
“Let’s make something clear — if you’re walking around in body armor and carrying an AR-15, our deputies are going to do what they have to do to keep our citizens safe. Public safety comes first. Always.”
Mark Price is a National Reporter for McClatchy News. He joined the network of newspapers in 1991 at The Charlotte Observer, covering beats including schools, crime, immigration, LGBTQ issues, homelessness and nonprofits. He graduated from the University of Memphis with majors in journalism and art history, and a minor in geology.
A man’s attempt at vigilante justice led to him mistakenly shooting at law enforcement personnel who were in the middle of a foot chase, the San Joaquin County Sheriff’s Office said Thursday.Deputies were looking for the people who triggered an alarm around 1:25 a.m. at the Pick-n-Pull along Clark Drive in Stockton, the sheriff’s office said. When they got to the business, deputies spotted three people and ran after them, heading west from the northeast perimeter of the property.The sheriff’s office said when a nearby homeowner’s security camera alerted him of activity, instead of calling law enforcement, he called his grandson. That grandson then armed himself with an AR-15 and rode off in a golf cart, thinking he was tracking the people deputies were chasing.When the grandson encountered the deputies who followed their suspects to a Buddhist temple by the Pick-n-Pull, the sheriff’s office said he fired two shots at deputies before they could announce their presence, forcing them to take cover.Deputies shouted commands at the grandson, who complied with them, and the sheriff’s office said they took him into custody.The sheriff’s office learned that one of the bullets hit a cement wall that was directly below where a deputy was monitoring for any additional people running away from the Pick-n-Pull.No deputies were hurt, and the sheriff’s office said no deputies fired back at the grandson.”This incident underscores the vital importance of allowing trained law enforcement to handle dangerous situations,” the sheriff’s office said. “Taking the law into your own hands can escalate conflicts and lead to tragic outcomes. We are grateful that our deputies returned home safely to their families, and we encourage the public to trust and support our law enforcement professionals in their crucial work.”Details were not released on if the grandson was arrested or if he was released afterward. It is also unknown if deputies are still searching for the people who triggered the alarm at Pick-n-Pull.Do you have photos or video of an incident? If so, upload them to KCRA.com/upload. Be sure to include your name and additional details so we can give you proper credit online and on TV.See more coverage of top California stories here | Download our app | Subscribe to our morning newsletter
STOCKTON, Calif. —
A man’s attempt at vigilante justice led to him mistakenly shooting at law enforcement personnel who were in the middle of a foot chase, the San Joaquin County Sheriff’s Office said Thursday.
Deputies were looking for the people who triggered an alarm around 1:25 a.m. at the Pick-n-Pull along Clark Drive in Stockton, the sheriff’s office said. When they got to the business, deputies spotted three people and ran after them, heading west from the northeast perimeter of the property.
The sheriff’s office said when a nearby homeowner’s security camera alerted him of activity, instead of calling law enforcement, he called his grandson. That grandson then armed himself with an AR-15 and rode off in a golf cart, thinking he was tracking the people deputies were chasing.
San Joaquin County Sheriff’s Office
When the grandson encountered the deputies who followed their suspects to a Buddhist temple by the Pick-n-Pull, the sheriff’s office said he fired two shots at deputies before they could announce their presence, forcing them to take cover.
Deputies shouted commands at the grandson, who complied with them, and the sheriff’s office said they took him into custody.
The sheriff’s office learned that one of the bullets hit a cement wall that was directly below where a deputy was monitoring for any additional people running away from the Pick-n-Pull.
San Joaquin County Sheriff’s Office
No deputies were hurt, and the sheriff’s office said no deputies fired back at the grandson.
“This incident underscores the vital importance of allowing trained law enforcement to handle dangerous situations,” the sheriff’s office said. “Taking the law into your own hands can escalate conflicts and lead to tragic outcomes. We are grateful that our deputies returned home safely to their families, and we encourage the public to trust and support our law enforcement professionals in their crucial work.”
Details were not released on if the grandson was arrested or if he was released afterward. It is also unknown if deputies are still searching for the people who triggered the alarm at Pick-n-Pull.
Do you have photos or video of an incident? If so, upload them to KCRA.com/upload. Be sure to include your name and additional details so we can give you proper credit online and on TV.
Deputy Police Chief Tonya Arrington of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department told reporters on Friday, May 31, 2024, that police confirmed there was only one shooter in the April 29 shootout on Galway Drive in which four officers were killed. Arrington spoke at CMPD headquarters in uptown.
Jeff A. Chamer
Jeff A. Chamer
Charlotte-Mecklenburg police confirmed Friday that there was only one shooter firing at officers on April 29 when they tried to arrest him, an incident in which eight officers were shot, four fatally.
The officers exchanged gunfire with Terry Clark Hughes Jr., who moved between several second-floor windows of the house on Galway Drive before he jumped from a window at the front of the home and was fatally shot by police.
“Officers were actively engaged with gunfire from the suspect for over 17 minutes,” said Deputy Chief Tonya Arrington. “That’s an eternity. They were in a gun battle.”
Arrington and Police Chief Johnny Jennings provided the updates at a press briefing at police headquarters.
Police also confirmed that all shell casings found inside the home were from the AR-15 Hughes was using, Arrington said. Hughes also had a handgun on him when he jumped from the window, but it wasn’t used in the shootout.
Because the home had not been cleared and deemed safe, and because an officer saw movement from one of the windows where Hughes had been shooting even after he was outside, officers used “suppressive fire” on the windows for another two minutes to give law enforcement time to evacuate those who were wounded, Arrington said.
“We know this was not sympathetic or friendly fire,” Arrington said, confirming something the chief had previously said. “We can confirm that the suspect was responsible for all who were shot in the line of duty that day.”
A U.S. Marshals Service fugitive task force made of federal, state and local officers had gone to the home to arrest Hughes on pending warrants for eluding police in a January chase in Lincoln County and felonious possession of a firearm, officials have said. But Hughes began firing at them with an AR-15 rifle.
Three task force members were killed: State Department of Adult Correction Officers William “Alden” Elliott and Sam Poloche, and Deputy U.S. Marshal Thomas M. “Tommy” Weeks Jr. CMPD Officer Joshua Eyer, who was among officers who responded to the shooting after it started, also was killed.
Charlotte-Mecklenburg police provided this diagram of the upper level of the home at 5525 Galway Drive, where a man fired on officers April 29 after they arrived to arrest him on pending warrants. CMPD
Hughes told a woman and 17-year-old in the house to get out or get down before he started shooting, Arrington said.
After Hughes was shot in the front yard and the two women were safely evacuated, police used an armored vehicle to tear off the walls in the front of the house. Arrington said Friday police did that because they weren’t sure if there was another shooter inside the house or not.
Asked about the location the two women in the home during the shootout, Arrington said she didn’t have the information.
“I know that after he told them to ‘get out or get down’ that they got down,” she said.
They were “hunkered down” until Hughes was shot and killed, and then law enforcement began communication with them, Arrington said. They got out of the home safely.
“We did do gunshot residue tests on the females at the scene and that has been sent to the state, but we are confident that they were not involved in the shooting,” Arrington said.
Because they were no other guns found inside of the home, there was nothing for them to shoot at law enforcement with, she said.
Task force tactics
Arrington declined to comment on the surveillance and investigation that preceded the task force’s attempt to deliver the warrant, or if Hughes was prepared for the officers’ arrival.
She did confirm, however, that the arriving marshals task force initially used a megaphone to direct Hughes to surrender.
“It’s a tactic that we use every day, it’s called ‘surround and call out’ and what we’re doing is giving the suspect every opportunity to come out peacefully, and, you know, surrender to the officers that are there,” Arrington said. “So there’s no doubt who we are, what we’re there for.”
That is a standard protocol, she said.
Thus far the investigation has included reviewing, Arrington said, footage from 1,128 body-worn camera videos, 8,903 images, 65 officer interviews and 765 pieces of physical evidence.
“This was a rapidly evolving and chaotic scene. Circumstances were changing by the minute. We ask that you continue to respect this process, and what our law enforcement community went through that day,” Arrington said. “It was an unprecedented tragedy for this community.”
This story was originally published May 31, 2024, 8:31 PM.
Related stories from Charlotte Observer
Jeff A. Chamer is a breaking news reporter for the Charlotte Observer. He’s lived a few places, but mainly in Michigan where he grew up. Before joining the Observer, Jeff covered K-12 and higher education at the Worcester Telegram & Gazette in Massachusetts.
SANDUSKY, OH—Following a mass shooting at an area mall that left 12 dead and another seven wounded, law enforcement officials released to the public Friday a novelty Wild West photo of the suspect they had taken into custody. “Thanks to the actions of our quick-thinking officers, we were able to arrest the shooter, fingerprint him, and swing by [local amusement park] Cedar Point to pose for one of those fun old-timey portraits with him,” said Sandusky Police Chief Greg Hartwell, who, alongside the suspected murderer, appears in the resulting sepia-toned photograph wearing a white hat, a Western-style vest, and a duster, along with accessories such as a kerchief, a watch chain, and an imitation Colt revolver. “In the process of booking the perpetrator, we informed him of his right to choose from a fancy fringed cowboy outfit, a series of fake mustaches, and an oversized jug marked ‘XXX,’ but he waived these options in favor of a plain denim shirt. The gunman did ask to hold his own AR-15-style rifle during the photo shoot, but we of course could not allow this, as it would not have been period correct.” Hartwell went on to ask if any of the reporters present would be willing to wear his badge and gun while he held two large sacks marked with dollar signs and reenacted a bank robbery for the camera.
TALLAHASSEE, FL—In an effort to achieve greater equality among a community deeply woven into the fabric of the state’s culture, a new Florida bill signed into law Friday would allow guns to start businesses. “For too long, pistols and semiautomatic rifles have been excluded from full participation in our state’s economy, and this law seeks to rectify that immediately,” said Gov. Ron DeSantis, arguing that law-abiding 9 mm handguns and AR-15-style weapons have a constitutional right to engage in commerce just as any other valued member of the public would. “Going forward, firearms will be able to open nail salons, pizzerias, massage parlors, or any other establishment they wish in pursuit of their own American dream. Did you know that even though they make up 55% of the U.S. population, there are zero gun CEOs in America?” DeSantis added that he would love see a thriving Little Guntown neighborhood in downtown Miami or Orlando.
“I boycott any company that tramples on the rights of Americans, whether it’s Bud Light, Walmart, Ford, Tesla, Amazon, McDonald’s, Halliburton, Circle K, basically the entire hotel industry, the vast majority of hospitals, and almost everyone who produces, makes, or distributes food.”
A new report indicates that officers who delayed their response to last year’s school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, did so in part because they were scared of the gunman’s rifle.
“You knew that it was definitely an AR,” Uvalde Police Department Sgt. Donald Page said in an interview with investigators after the shooting at Robb Elementary School. “There was no way of going in.”
The new police interviews and body camera evidence come from a report by The Texas Tribune, which published its investigation into the poor police response on Monday.
On May 24, 2022, an 18-year-old gunman entered Robb Elementary in Uvalde and killed 19 children and two teachers with an AR-15 rifle. From the moment the shooter was finally killed by police, questions were raised about why it took more than a dozen officers over an hour to breach the doors of the classroom where the shooter had locked himself in with the victims.
Days after the shooting, the director of the Texas Department of Public Safety said it was the “wrong decision” for officers to have waited.
“With the benefit of hindsight, where I’m sitting now, of course it was not the right decision, it was the wrong decision, there was no excuse for that,” DPS director Steven McCraw told reporters.
Police walk near Robb Elementary School following a shooting that killed 19 children and two teachers, May 24, 2022, in Uvalde, Texas.
Dario Lopez-Mills via Associated Press
Another official, Lt. Chris Olivarez, said three days after the shooting that police delayed their response because they “could’ve been shot.”
The Texas Tribune report further highlights the fears police had as the minutes ticked by and kids were executed.
In a radio call to dispatch during the shooting, Uvalde Police Department Sgt. Daniel Coronado warned others about the gun.
“I have a male subject with an AR,” Coronado said, according to the publication.
“Fuck,” another officer responded.
Officials ultimately decided to wait for a Border Patrol SWAT team, which had more protective armor and better training.
“We weren’t equipped to make entry into that room without several casualties,” Uvalde Police Department Detective Louis Landry said in an interview obtained by the Tribune.
“Once we found out it was a rifle he was using, it was a different game plan we would have had to come up with,” Landry said. “It wasn’t just going in guns blazing, the Old West style, and take him out.”
In July, Texas State University’s Advanced Law Enforcement Rapid Response Training program published a report detailing the multiple failures of law enforcement at the time, and concluded that officers should not have retreated even if they were in fear for their lives.
“We commend the officers for quickly entering the building and moving toward the sounds of gunfire,” the report said. “However, when the officers were fired at, momentum was lost. The officers fell back, and it took more than an hour to regain momentum and gain access to critically injured people.”
During that hour, police waited for ballistics shields and gas canisters, according to the ALERRT report. (The gas canisters were ultimately never used.) Less than a minute after police received their fourth ballistics shield, the shooter could be heard firing four shots in the classroom.
It’s possible that lives could have been saved if officers had responded appropriately, according to the ALERRT report.
“While we do not have definitive information at this point, it is possible that some of the people who died during this event could have been saved if they had received more rapid medical care,” the report said.
A hard-reset trigger engineered to last and endure repetitive use.
GAINESVILLE, Fla., September 22, 2021 (Newswire.com)
– Big Daddy Unlimited has announced the Wide Open Trigger is now available, a state-of-the-art, plug-and-play, drop-in replacement trigger for the AR-15 platform.
The Wide Open Trigger delivers an exceptionally smooth, crisp, creep-free trigger pull. No gunsmithing, fitting, or adjusting is required. Just drop it in and go.
Tony McKnight, Co-Founder, Big Daddy Unlimited, had this to say, “The Wide Open Trigger is yet another revolutionary new product taking the firearms industry by storm as the first true plug-and-play, drop-in AR-15 hard-reset trigger. It’s extremely rugged and reliable, and it’s been tested and warrantied for more than 10,000 rounds.”
The Wide Open Trigger (WOT) is a two-stage, hard-reset trigger for AR-15 platforms chambered in .223 Remington/5.56 NATO that allows the user the ability to shoot faster, while still allowing only one single shot per trigger pull.
The trigger is designed to shorten the length and time a trigger needs to reset itself, by using the elastic energy of the patent-pending spring carrier. When compressed, the spring carrier forces the trigger into a neutral or reset position.
The only requirements to run the Wide Open Trigger effectively and reliably in your AR-15 platform are an M16 bolt carrier group (BCG) and a standard H2 or H3 buffer.
The Wide Open Trigger is made to resist the wear and tear that other triggers can’t live up to, and it’s tested and warrantied up to 10,000 rounds. Even common issues like pin walkout are not an issue with the proprietary design that uses a patent-pending spring carrier and comes with anti-walk pins.
The WOT is engineered with Hardox™ steel to last for the life of your firearm and endure repetitive use. It’s easily installed without the help of a professional gunsmith. We recommend having a gunsmith install and inspect your firearm if you plan on running it on an AR-15 chambered in .300 AAC Blackout or 9mm.
Big Daddy Unlimited (BDU) is revolutionizing the online gun-, gear-, and ammo-buying process with the largest selection of in-stock products at everyday industry-leading prices. Our mission is to help our members exercise their Second Amendment right at prices they can live with while giving them the VIP service they deserve. Our passion for the 2A is unyielding, and we patriotically defend the freedoms upon which our great country was founded.
Our sales and services teams are the greatest benefit of our membership program and truly what sets us apart from other companies in the firearms industry. A quick call into BDU is the fastest way to solve a problem or grab that hard-to-find item. Give us a call at (800) 915-7709 to become a member today.
Press Contact: Keira Rodriguez Director of Content TallGrass Public Relations keira.rodriguez@tallgrasspr.com
