Another west Texas mass shooting plot with an AK-47 is foiled by grandmother
Just days after a deadly shooting took the lives of 22 people in El Paso comes word that another planned mass shooting in west Texas was stopped.
A Lubbock man, identified as 19-year-old William Patrick Williams, has been arrested by FBI agents, the U.S. Attorney’s Office of the Northern District of Texas announced.
According to a criminal complaint, the Lubbock man had told his grandmother that he’d bought an AK-47 rifle recently, planned to “shoot up” a local hotel, then force police to kill him. Sensing that her grandson was both suicidal and homicidal, the woman persuaded him to be hospitalized instead; Williams’ arrest came after his discharge from the hospital.
During a search of Williams’ hotel room, FBI agents said they found the rifle, 17 ammunition-filled magazines, knives, tactical gloves and black clothing.
“This was a tragedy averted,” said U.S. Attorney Nealy Cox. “I want to praise the defendant’s grandmother, who saved lives by interrupting this plot, as well as the Lubbock police officers and federal agents who investigated his unlawful acquisition of a deadly weapon.”
Williams is in the Lubbock County Jail currently and has been charged with making false statements to a firearms dealer. He’s accused of giving the gun dealer an outdated address; the offense carries up to five years in federal prison.
