'We thought it was the end': Armed St Louis couple describe moment '300-500 BLM protesters broke down gate and got within 30ft of their mansion while threatening to kill them and burn down their house'
By Harry Howard
Daily Mail
July 7, 2020
A St Louis couple who made headlines after they were pictured standing on their porch aiming guns at Black Lives Matter protesters claimed up to 500 demonstrators broke down their gate and threatened to kill them.
Photos
of the couple, lawyers Mark and Patricia McCloskey, standing outside
their palatial property armed with an AR-15 and a handgun were beamed
around the world at the end of June.
On
Friday, hundreds of demonstrators returned to their upscale
neighbourhood to protest once more and the couple were seen tentatively
peering from their balcony.
And
speaking to Fox News on Tuesday about the first incident, prominent
personal injury lawyer Mr McClosky said: 'It was shocking. The gate came
in. Seemingly everybody in the world came forward. I think the estimate
is 300-500 people.
'They came right towards 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. People were
screaming everything.'
Asked what the
protesters were shouting at them, Mrs McClosky added: 'That they were
going to kill us, they were going to come in there, they were going to
burn down the house, they were going to be living in our house after I
was dead.'
She said they pointed to
different rooms in the house and said "that's going to be my bedroom"
before threatening to kill their dog when it barked.
Mr
McClosky said he started trying to arrange private security for the
house when the couple received a tip saying the protesters were planning
to come back to 'get us and burn the house'.
'We had been told that the city police had
been ordered to stand down, we had been told there was going to be no
official help,' he said.
'Our neighbourhood association put out a flyer saying if people broke in they were just going to let them.
'So we started trying to hire private security and entity after entity said they did not want to get involved.'
The
situation became so bad that the couple started 'hiding' their
valuables and were told by one security firm of former special forces
members to 'walk away' and 'abandon' the house.
Instead, the couple stayed put and said the second protest was loud but non-violent.
The local police were there and the couple did eventually get their own security.
'We had a good routine on Friday. The local police stood up like champs and we had our own security,' he added.
'Everything happened just like it’s supposed to happen. The crowd was loud but they weren’t allowed to do anything wrong.'
At
the second protest on Sunday, the couple were seen sitting on their
balcony with their attorney as private security patrolled up and down.
Demonstrators chanted and brandished placards outside the residence for around 15 minutes before moving on.
In an earlier interview recalling what
happened, Mr McCloskey claimed his and his wife's actions had nothing to
do with race and that he did not know what race the protesters were.
McCloskey claimed that his actions had nothing to do with race and that he didn't care what race the protesters were.
'Here's
the interesting thing, I spent my career defending people that are
defenseless for people who are having a hard time making their oracle
happen, for people that don't have a voice,' he continued.
'My
black clients love us. The night this happened I had some of our black
clients calling us, telling us how wrong it was the way the press was
writing us up, telling us how wrong it was that we should be portrayed
as racist.
'This is what I do for a
living. I help people that are down or that need a hand and people that
need a voice,' McCloskey added.
'To
call us racist is ridiculous and it had nothing to do with race. I
wasn't worried what the race was [of] the mob that came through my gate,
I was worried that I was going to be killed. I didn't care what race
they were.'
The video of the couple's standoff went
viral with some supporting the pair's right to protect their private
property and others claiming that they broke the law by threatening a
peaceful protest.
Police said that people in the crowd yelled threats at the couple and that the McCloskeys would not be charged.
They
added that they are still investigating but labeled it a case of
trespassing and assault by intimidation against the couple by protesters
in the racially diverse crowd.
According to the NRA,
state law does not prohibit the open carrying of firearms, but does
prohibit exhibiting 'any weapon readily capable of lethal use' in an
angry or threatening manner in the presence of one or more persons.
Exhibiting
a weapon in this way would likely be a Class D felony punishable by up
to four years in prison and a fine not to exceed $5,000.
According to the St. Louis American, however, the 'Castle Doctrine' allows people to use deadly force to attack an intruder on their property.
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