St. Louis Circuit Prosecutor Kim Gardner said Monday that he is charging the couple who shot guns at a crowd marching to the mayor’s office last month for the illegal use of a gun.
Gardner, the city’s chief prosecutor, said Mark and Patricia McCloskey also faced a fourth-degree felony assault charge for the June 28 incident.
“It is illegal to wave weapons in a threatening manner, that is illegal in the city of St. Louis,” Gardner said in a statement. She added that she was recommending a diversion program like community service instead of jail.
The McCloskeys have said many times that they were defending themselves, with high tensions in St. Louis and other cities over race and law enforcement. They said that the crowd of protesters broke an iron gate marked with “No Trespassing” and “Private Street” signs, and that some violently threatened them.
In a statement to Fox News, the couple’s attorney, Joel Schwartz, called the charges “discouraging.”
“I, along with my clients, support the First Amendment right of every citizen to have their voice and opinion heard,” said Schwartz. “However, this right must be balanced with the Second Amendment and Missouri law, which empowers each of us to protect our home and family from possible threats.”
The husband and wife told “Hannity” earlier this month that they were sitting down to dinner on their porch when “300 to 500 people” burst into the door of their community and started marching towards them.
“[They said] they were going to kill us, “Patricia McCloskey recalled at the time.” They were going to go in there. They were going to burn down the house. They were going to live in our house after I died, and they pointed to different rooms and said, ‘That will be my room and that will be the living room and I am going to shower. that room.'”
They argued that they were protecting their home.
St. Louis police confiscated the rifle from the couple’s home in accordance with a search warrant.
Mark and Patricia McCloskey pulled out their firearms from the crowd marching toward St. Louis Mayor Lyda Krewson’s home last month. (DANIEL SHULAR / via REUTERS, File)
Missouri Gov. Mike Parson, a Republican, said Friday that he would consider forgiving the couple if they were criminally charged.
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“A mafia has no right to collect your property,” he told Parson on 97.1 FM. “They had every right to protect themselves.”
This is a developing story; Check back for updates. Associated Press contributed to this report.
