{"id":15998,"date":"2023-12-18T10:24:18","date_gmt":"2023-12-18T04:54:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/farratanews.online\/fellow-u-s-army-reservist-downplayed-threat-posed-by-maine-mass-shooter-before-attack\/"},"modified":"2023-12-18T10:24:18","modified_gmt":"2023-12-18T04:54:18","slug":"fellow-u-s-army-reservist-downplayed-threat-posed-by-maine-mass-shooter-before-attack","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/farratanews.online\/fellow-u-s-army-reservist-downplayed-threat-posed-by-maine-mass-shooter-before-attack\/","title":{"rendered":"Fellow U.S. Army reservist downplayed threat posed by Maine mass shooter before attack"},"content":{"rendered":"

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A fellow U.S. Army reservist interviewed by police about the\u00a0Lewiston, Maine, mass shooter\u00a0the month prior to the attack downplayed warnings about him, body camera recordings show.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Sept. 16 footage, which captured audio but blurred the face of the reservist, identified in a private Maine lawyer\u2019s report to a local sheriff\u2019s office as Capt. Jeremy Reamer, was released Saturday by police in Saco, Maine, where the reserve base is located, following a Freedom of Information Act request filed by NBC News.<\/p>\n

The officers, identified in that lawyer\u2019s review of the Sagadahoc County Sheriff\u2019s Office as Saco Police Department officers Rodney Rossignol and Amber Damon, told Reamer that Robert Card, 40, may have wanted to open fire at the base and that they were on the lookout for two vehicle license plates connected to Card.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Law enforcement found Card\u2019s body with a self-inflicted gunshot wound near the Androscoggin River in Lisbon Falls on Oct. 27, two days after he allegedly killed 18 people at two businesses in Lewiston. The attack is the deadliest mass shooting in Maine\u2019s history.<\/p>\n

Reamer told the two officers that Card \u201cnever made any specific threats\u201d and that base officials at National Guard Base in Saco, where the bodycam recordings took place, were \u201cnot expecting him to be here.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

He also said the soldier who initially reported concerns about Card \u201cis not the most credible.\u201d But, in regards to Card, Reamer said, \u201cHe did say he would shoot places, but didn\u2019t say here,\u201d according to the recordings.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He said he spoke on the phone with Card the previous day, when Card expressed anger over those in his unit who reported his erratic behavior in the summer. The reporting prompted New York State Police to\u00a0take him to Keller Army Community Hospital\u00a0at the U.S. Military Academy for evaluation in July, a Defense Department official said.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/picture>
A U.S. Army reservist who spoke to police officers downplayed the threat of the Lewiston, Maine, mass shooter in the month prior to the deadly attack. <\/span>Saco Police Department<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The officers conducting the less than 5-minute interview asked the captain, identified in the report to the sheriff as the commander of Card\u2019s company, if they should continue to stake out his home to keep an eye on him. \u201cI don\u2019t see that we need to tie you guys up,\u201d Reamer responded.<\/p>\n

If the shooter arrived at the base with violent intentions, Reamer said, \u201cWe will do our best to kind of deescalate, handle it, on our end.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s not supposed to be here,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The captain said a number of area police officers were also U.S. Army soldiers at the base.\u00a0<\/p>\n

About three hours after speaking with the Saco Police Department officers, Reamer was on the phone with a Sagadahoc County Sheriff\u2019s Office sergeant. According to a transcript of the 8-minute-long call, the sergeant told Reamer that \u201cwe\u2019re very concerned over this\u201d and that he had \u201ca lot of documentation that said to me they\u2019re worried about (Card) doing a mass shooting,\u201d and that Card had been having hallucinations.<\/p>\n

During the call, Reamer told the sergeant that he didn\u2019t know the \u201cvalidity\u201d of a text message sent by the soldier who reported being concerned that Card was \u201cgoing to snap and do a mass shooting.\u201d Reamer said a text of that nature needs to be taken \u201cvery seriously,\u201d but also that it should be taken with \u201ca grain of salt as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

The characterization of Reamer\u2019s actions in\u00a0the Maine lawyer\u2019s review\u00a0reflected what was seen on the recordings reviewed by NBC News, saying Reamer told the two officers that \u201cthere was no need for the Saco Police to continue its protective detail at the Reserve Center, noting that the Saco Police would be called if any assistance became necessary. Accordingly, the Saco Police Department discontinued the protective detail around the Reserve Center.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reamer did not immediately respond to a request for comment.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The review\u2019s author, lawyer Michael A. Cunniff, is a former U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration supervisory special agent who worked with police and deputies across Maine on narcotics task forces. In an email, he said he has never worked with the Sagadahoc County sheriff, Joel A. Merry, and said his\u00a0office \u201cretained me to conduct an objective review of (its) response to concerns about the mental health of Robert Card.\u201d<\/p>\n

Though he was paid by Sagadahoc County\u00a0government to conduct the review, Cunniff said, \u201cI had a duty to remain independent of, not dependent on, the county.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cunniff\u2019s review of the Sagadahoc County Sheriff\u2019s Office\u2019s response to concerns around Card\u2019s mental health said an officer with another police department in the region told police looking into the threat posed by Card that Card was not allowed to handle weapons on-base.<\/p>\n

The review stated that the deputies did their duty when they twice tried to contact Card but failed, concluding that they had no grounds to detain him, commit him, or take his weapons. It said deputies relied on family members who said they would confiscate his weapons that September.<\/p>\n

Law enforcement who conducted two searches for the shooter on Oct. 26 failed to check a parking lot at the recycling facility where he once worked and was believed to have possibly sought refuge, officials acknowledged at the time.\u00a0<\/p>\n

His body was found the next day in a box trailer in that parking lot after\u00a0the facility\u2019s owner told officers\u00a0the lot stored the trailers and could provide a good hiding spot.<\/p>\n

\"Image:<\/picture>
In an aerial view, law enforcement officials are seen on Oct. 28 investigating the area where the suspect was found dead in Lisbon, Maine.<\/span>Joe Raedle \/ Getty Images<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Maine enacted a \u201cyellow flag\u201d law in 2019 that allows authorities to confiscate weapons from those believed to be at risk of immediate violence, but critics say it requires a number of steps \u2014 family reporting, law enforcement contact, medical evaluation \u2014 that render it difficult to implement in real-world conditions.<\/p>\n

In an email, sheriff Merry said that in order to trigger the yellow flag process, a person has to be taken into protective custody. The deputies who tried to contact Card were not able to take him into custody because he \u201crefused to speak with the deputies or make himself available,\u201d Merry said.<\/p>\n

Democratic Gov. Janet Mills and Attorney General Aaron Frey launched what they described as an independent commission that will review events leading to the Lewiston attack.<\/p>\n

U.S. Army Under Secretary Gabe Camarillo said in a recent letter to U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, that he was requesting the Army Inspector General launch an investigation into how the U.S. Army Reserve handled warnings about the shooter.<\/p>\n

\u00a0U.S. Army Public Affairs did not immediately issue a statement.<\/p>\n

\"Image:<\/picture>
Snow accumulates outside a bowling alley on Dec. 5 at a makeshift memorial for the victims of the shooting in Lewiston, Maine.<\/span>Robert F. Bukaty \/ AP<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n[ad_2]\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[ad_1] A fellow U.S. Army reservist interviewed by police about the\u00a0Lewiston, Maine, mass shooter\u00a0the month prior to the attack downplayed warnings about him, body camera recordings show.\u00a0 The Sept. 16 footage, which captured audio but blurred the face of the reservist, identified in a private Maine lawyer\u2019s report to a local sheriff\u2019s office as Capt. …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16000,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/farratanews.online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15998"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/farratanews.online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/farratanews.online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/farratanews.online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/farratanews.online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15998"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/farratanews.online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15998\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/farratanews.online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16000"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/farratanews.online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/farratanews.online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/farratanews.online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}