Missouri couple who pointed guns at BLM protesters seek return of firearms
Mark and Patricia McCloskey, a Missouri couple who became famous for pointing guns at protesters marching for racial justice in 2020, are trying to get their firearms back after it emerged the city of St Louis had not yet destroyed them.
Mark McCloskey, who was pardoned after pleading guilty to weapons charges, sued St Louis, the city sheriff and the state to retrieve the guns and told a court hearing on Wednesday that the pardons also entitled the couple to a refund of their fines.
“The loss of that property would certainly be a legal disqualification, impediment or other legal disadvantage, of which I have now been absolved by the governor, and therefore the state no longer has any legitimate reason to hold the property,” McCloskey said.
Robert Dierker of the City Counselor’s Office told a judge during a virtual hearing on Wednesday that the guns have not been disposed of, the St Louis Post-Dispatch reported. “Obviously with our customary efficiency, we should have destroyed [the weapons] months ago,” Dierker said. “We haven’t. So McCloskey’s a beneficiary of bureaucratic, I want to say, ineptitude.”
The McCloskeys, both lawyers in their 60s, said they felt threatened by the protesters who walked down their private street during global protests that followed the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. Mark McCloskey emerged from his home with an AR-15style rifle, and Patricia McCloskey waved a semi-automatic pistol.
Photos and cellphone video captured the confrontation, which drew widespread attention and made the couple heroes to some and villains to others. No shots were fired, and no one was hurt.
The use of weapons led to charges and the McCloskeys both pleaded guilty in June to misdemeanors. As part of the plea, they voluntarily gave up the guns. Republican Governor Mike Parson granted pardons weeks later. Mark McCloskey is running for the US Senate as a Republican.
The City Counselor’s Office contends that Parson’s pardon obliterated the conviction, but not the plea agreement in which McCloskey forfeited the guns.
Circuit Judge Joan Moriarty took the case under advisement.