Missouri Gov. Mike Parson announced on Tuesday that he fulfilled his promise to pardon a couple who gained notoriety last year for pointing guns at social justice demonstrators as they marched past the couple’s home in a posh St. Louis enclave.
Mark McCloskey, who pleaded guilty in June to misdemeanor fourth-degree assault and was fined $750, and Patricia McCloskey, who pleaded guilty to misdemeanor harassment and was fined $2,000, were both pardoned by Parson, a Republican, on Friday.
The demonstrators, who were passing their home in June 2020 on their way to rally in front of the mayor’s house nearby in one of the hundreds of such demonstrations around the country following George Floyd’s death, made the McCloskeys, both lawyers in their 60s, feel frightened.
The group was also trespassing on a private street, according to the couple.
According to the indictment, Mark McCloskey emerged from his residence brandishing an AR-15-style weapon, while Patricia McCloskey waved a semiautomatic pistol.
The incident was filmed on camera and on smartphone video, and it garnered global attention, making the pair heroes to some and criminals to others.
There were no shots fired, and no one was injured when that happened.
According to Special Prosecutor Richard Callahan’s investigation, the demonstrators were nonviolent.
After the McCloskeys pleaded guilty, Callahan noted in a news release, “There was no proof that any of them had a weapon, and no one I interviewed recognized they had strayed onto a private enclave.”
After the plea hearing, Mark McCloskey, who launched his candidacy for the United States Senate in Missouri in May, was unapologetic.
From the courtroom steps in downtown St. Louis couple, he remarked, “I’d do it again.”
“Whenever the mob comes near me, I’ll do everything I can to put them in danger of physical harm because that’s what saved them from destroying my house and my family.”
The McCloskeys did not risk losing their law licenses or their right to own firearms because the charges were misdemeanors.
In October, a grand jury indicted the McCloskeys on felony charges of improper use of a weapon and evidence tampering.
Callahan eventually changed the charges to allow jurors to choose between misdemeanor harassment convictions and the weapons charge.
