Mark McCloskey

At RNC, St. Louis Couple Rips Democrats: No One in Mob Charged — Just us

Patricia and Mark McCloskey, the St. Louis couple menaced at their home by a massive mob of trespassing Black Lives Matter protesters, issued a stark warning at Monday night’s Republican National Convention about what life under Democrat rule look like if Joe Biden becomes president. Here is a partial transcript: PATRICIA MCCLOSKEY: What you saw happen to us could just as easily happen to any of you who are watching from quiet neighborhoods around our country, and that’s what we want to speak to you about tonight. MARK MCCLOSKEY: Whether it’s defunding the police, ending cash bail so criminals can be released back out on the streets the same day to riot again, or encouraging anarchy on our streets, it seems as if Democrats no longer view the government’s job as protecting honest citizens from criminals, but rather protecting criminals from honest citizens. Not a single person in the out-of-control mob you saw at our house was charged with a crime. But you know who was? We were. They’ve actually charged us with a felony for daring to defend our home. On top of that, consider this: The liberal activist leading a mob to our neighborhood stood outside of our home with a bullhorn screaming, “You can’t stop the revolution!” Just weeks later, that same activist won the Democrat nomination to hold a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. The radicals are not content just marching in the streets. They want to walk the halls of Congress. They want power. This is Joe Biden’s party. These are the people who will be in charge. Patricia then warns about the changes Biden has promised to make that will destroy peaceful and safe suburbs: PATRICIA MCCLOSKEY: They’re not satisfied with spreading the chaos and violence in our communities. They want to abolish the suburbs all-together by ending single-family home zoning. This forced rezoning would bring crime, lawlessness and low-quality apartments into thriving suburban neighborhoods. President Trump smartly ended this government overreach, but Joe Biden wants to bring it back. The couple became somewhat famous in late June when video was released on social media of them standing in front of their house holding firearms. Patricia held a handgun. Mark held a semi-automatic rifle. While the mob of about a hundred taunted and threatened them with murder and rape, the couple warned the hostile group they were trespassing — which they were. Worse still, the mob broke down a security gate to gain access to the private road in front of the McCloskey’s Renaissance palazzo-style residence, a place of pride for the two attorneys, who spent years and untold amounts of money restoring and renovating it. Outnumbered 50-to-1, the McCloskeys had every right in the world to be out there brandishing guns. At the time, the left-wing terrorists in Antifa and Black Lives Matter were ravaging countless cities. Riots, assaults, arson, looting, and mayhem was widespread. It still is. “[W]hen I saw that mob coming through the gate with their rage and their anger, I thought that we would be overrun in a second,” Mark told the Fox News Channel’s Tucker Carlson just days after the incident. “By the time I was out there with my rifle, the people were 20 or 30 feet from my front wall. I’ve got a low wall that separates my house from my front yard. And so, I was literally afraid that within seconds they would surmount the wall, and come into the house, kill us, burn the house down and everything that I had worked for and struggled for for the last 32 years.” “I saw it all going up in flames, and my life destroyed in an instant,” he added. “And I did what I thought I had to do to protect my hearth, my home and my family.” McCloskey was invited to appear on CNNLOL just so he could be smeared as a racist. But that was only the beginning of the persecution faced by the McCloskeys, a very public persecution deliberately designed to intimidate all Americans. The McCloskeys were made examples of by the left in the hopes we would all be afraid to defend our homes and families from these demonic marauders, these socialist revolutionaries who are nothing less than the Democrats’ and the media’s own personal Brownshirts. Although the mob had trespassed and vandalized, had essentially broken and entered, and many of their faces were caught and broadcast on social media, St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner, a Democrat, did not charge a single one them with anything. Instead, with the corporate media and the organized left cheering her on, she went after the McCloskeys. Gardner received and executed a search warrant of their home, which reportedly resulted in the confiscation of the firearms necessary to protect themselves should the mob return — which it did after Democrats and CNN painted a target on their backs. And then Gardner charged the couple with “felony unlawful use of a weapon.” “It is illegal to wave weapons in a threatening manner — that is unlawful in the city of St. Louis,” Gardner said in a statement. Apparently it is not illegal in St. Louis — or in any Democrat-run city — to break down doors and threaten people on their own property. The state attorney general, a Republican, stepped in and had the obscene, unlawful, politically-motivated charges dismissed. Click here to watch the McCloskeys speech:

 

Missouri governor says pardon likely if St. Louis homeowners charged

Missouri Gov. Mike Parson says he is prepared to exercise his pardon powers if prosecutors bring criminal charges in the case of a St. Louis couple who brandished firearms at a group of protesters outside their home. Parson, a Republican, told a St. Louis radio station Friday that he thinks a pardon is “exactly what would happen” if Mark and Patricia McCloskey are hit with charges in the June 28 incident captured on video and seen by millions. He later added that based on what he knows about the case, “I don’t think they’re going to spend any time in jail.” The McCloskeys, who are both attorneys, displayed guns as Black Lives Matter protesters walked onto the private street where they live. The protesters were headed to the home of St. Louis Mayor Lyda Krewson. State prosecutor Kim Gardner launched an investigation, saying, “we will not tolerate the use of force against those exercising their First Amendment rights.” St. Louis police seized a rifle from the couple’s home pursuant to a search warrant. Parson told 97.1 FM the McCloskeys “did what they legally should do,” according to The Hill newspaper. “A mob does not have the right to charge your property,” he said, according to the paper. “They had every right to protect themselves.” Parson linked to the interview on Twitter and added the comment, “We will not allow law-abiding citizens to be targeted for exercising their constitutional rights.” Gardner has not disclosed whether she intends to file charges, but several leading Republicans — including President Trump, Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., and Parson — have criticized her for even deciding to investigate the couple. Parson cited Missouri’s “castle doctrine” law that justifies lethal force for those protecting their homes. Hawley is seeking a U.S. Department of Justice investigation of Gardner. A spokeswoman for Gardner declined comment, citing the ongoing investigation.

This is playing out exactly as we predicted.  This self-serving, anti-gun, pro-criminal, liberal Democrat St. Louis City prosecutor Kim Gardner (D) has bitten off more than she can chew.  Sure, she’s getting her 15 mins of fame, and adoration from the criminal community.  But, she’s failing at her job.  So, kudos to Gov. Mike Parson (R-MO) for basically saying he’ll pardon the McCloskeys if any charges are brought against them, and to Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) for asking the DOJ to investigate Ms. Gardner.  After all, she FAILED to do her job when cops arrested 35 rioters during the post-George Floyd riots in St. Louis.  She just let them all go, without bringing any charges….which is her flipping job!  Instead, she’s going after law-abiding gun owners who were rightfully exercising their 2nd Amendment rights in protecting their home from the mob.

Gregg Jarrett: Armed couple who defended St. Louis home when threatened shouldn’t be prosecuted

Malcolm X once observed: “I don’t even call it violence when it’s in self-defense; I call it intelligence.” A St. Louis couple — Mark and Patricia McCloskey — recently chose to arm themselves for self-defense after a mob entered their property and allegedly threatened their lives. They insist they were acting justifiably and … yes … intelligently. They were also acting lawfully — as long as they were in fear and reasonably believed that the force of weapons they displayed was necessary to defend themselves from an imminent threat of harm. That is the law. As a logical extension of the Second Amendment right to bear arms, Missouri embraces a well-known common-law principle called the Castle Doctrine. The state’s expansive interpretation permitted the McCloskeys to use physical force to defend themselves and their home while on their own property, without requiring them to first retreat. There is some case law in Missouri that suggests that the couple would not have been permitted to shoot solely in defense of their property. However, the McCloskeys neither fired their weapons nor claimed they were protecting merely their land. Indeed, they say that several members of the mob were armed and vowed to set their home ablaze and murder them. If true, the couple was completely entitled under the law to brandish (and potentially use) physical force in self-defense. Patricia McCloskey told Sean Hannity on his Fox News show: “[They said] 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.” The McCloskeys explained that they first called 911 but no police arrived. They were left to defend themselves. Mark McCloskey told KSDK-TV that “the only thing that stopped the crowd was my rifle.” How is it possible, then, that St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kimberly Gardner is investigating the McCloskeys but not the mob that allegedly knocked down a wrought-iron gate and knowingly trespassed (signs were posted) on the McCloskey’s property? This is backward. Repeated threats of physical harm uttered by the mob would constitute an assault under the law. Yet, Gardner appears to be poised to charge the homeowners with assault over their right to defend against an alleged assault. Legally, this is not just senseless, but insane. It is well-established that a person is allowed to threaten force if he or she is threatened. The perpetrators do not suddenly become helpless victims when they are averted. The idiocy of Gardner’s reasoning was explained to Fox News by Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt, who stated that Gardner “has a record of making politically motivated decisions not based on the law.” No kidding. Schmitt called Gardner’s record in prosecuting violent crime “abysmal.” As chief prosecutor, Gardner cares more about defending criminals than helping victims. To her, justice is an antiquated bromide. This should come as no surprise, since Gardner’s 2016 election was funded, in part, by considerable cash funneled through a Super PAC backed financially by far-left billionaire George Soros. Gardner’s tenure has been notable only for the slew of lawsuits against her for allegedly ignoring public records requests. (Gardner appears to believe that the public is not allowed to read public records.) Her low conviction rate in prosecutions has brought solace and smiles to criminals. In a statement, Gardner called the mob “peaceful protestors who were met by guns and a violent assault.” There are two inconvenient problems with her remarks. First, Gardner has completely ignored or dismissed the evidence of the trespass and the McCloskey’s chilling account of the mob’s threats of arson and murder. Second, by publicly declaring the couple guilty of assault, she has demolished any presumption of innocence for the accused. The Constitution protects free speech, assembly and peaceful protests. These are cherished rights. But the First Amendment does not give license to demonstrators to transform themselves into criminals who engage in acts of threatened violence or other lawless conduct. The riots, looting, assaults, and murders that have escalated out of control in many cities across America in the aftermath of the George Floyd tragedy are not an excuse under the law to victimize innocent people and destroy property. Late last week, authorities armed with a search warrant seized the rifle that Mark McCloskey was shown holding the night of June 28. His wife’s pistol was already in the possession of their attorney. The seizure, together with Gardner’s statement, leaves little doubt that the McCloskeys will soon be facing criminal charges by an elected prosecutor who seems determined to abuse her power by capitulating to the demands of the mob. Gardner can’t possibly prevail if charges are brought. But I suspect that is not her objective. Prosecution of the McCloskeys serves a political nostrum. It would conform perfectly to the prevailing orthodoxy of liberal outrage that no one is now permitted to question without being condemned and/or canceled. We are told we must all recognize and affirm that disagreement, however well-reasoned, is no longer tolerated. Ideological purity must be elevated, as dissent is suffocated, we are told. The civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. was a legendary proponent of nonviolence. But he was not an absolutist. King well understood the moral and legal necessity of self-defense in a society that is not always civilized. King made this clear when he wrote: “The principle of self-defense, even involving weapons and bloodshed, has never been condemned, even by Gandhi.” Kimberly Gardner is not condemning self-defense as much as she is canceling it for purely political reasons driven by self-interest and self-promotion. She has no business being a government prosecutor if she harbors such contempt for the law.

Agreed 100%!!  Thanks to Gregg Jarrett for that spot-on legal analysis.  Gregg is a former defense attorney and adjunct law professor. He is the author of the No. 1 New York Times best-selling book “The Russia Hoax: The Illicit Scheme to Clear Hillary Clinton and Frame Donald Trump.” His latest book is the New York Times bestseller “Witch Hunt: The Story of the Greatest Mass Delusion in American Political History“