If the St. Louis prosecuting attorney charges and convicts a local couple for protecting their home from protestors, Gov. Mike Parson said he will issue a pardon. The Republican governor told a St. Louis radio station he believes a pardon is “exactly what would happen” if Mark and Patricia McCloskey are charged in the June 28 incident.
“Right now, that’s what I feel,” he said. “You don’t know until you hear all the facts. But right now, if this is all about going after them for doing a lawful act, then yeah, if that’s scenario ever happened, I don’t think they’re going to spend any time in jail.”
Parson later wrote on Twitter: “We will not allow law-abiding citizens to be targeted for exercising their constitutional rights.”
McCloskeys aimed guns at Black Lives Matter protesters after a group of some 300 protesters came into their neighborhood in St. Louis on June 28. The two have defended their actions by saying they felt their lives were in danger.
According to police reports, the McCloskeys told police that they heard a disturbance and saw “a large group of subjects forcefully break an iron gate marked with ‘No Trespassing’ and ‘Private Street’ signs.”
“The group began yelling obscenities and threats of harm to both victims,” St. Louis police told the “St. Louis Post-Dispatch”. “When the victims observed multiple subjects who were armed, they then armed themselves and contacted police.”
“It was shocking. The gate came in. Seemingly everybody in the world came forward. I think the estimate is 300 to 500 people,” Mark McCloskey told Fox News.. “They came right toward us. We were preparing to have dinner on the porch, and we were literally 70 feet from the gate. By the time we got our guns, by the time I got my gun, the crowd was probably 30 or 40 feet from us. We thought it was the end.”
–Alan Goforth | Metro Voice