Suspect arrested in Arizona DNC office shooting

TEMPE, Ariz. (AP) — An Arizona prosecutor said the man has been arrested shooting three times The official at a Democratic National Committee office in suburban Phoenix had more than 200 guns and over 250,000 rounds of ammunition in his home, leading law enforcement to believe he may have been planning a mass casualty event.

Maricopa County Prosecutor Neha Bhatia said at Jeffrey Michael Kelly’s first court appearance Wednesday that federal agents told her about the large seizure following Kelly’s arrest. Rifle scopes, body armor and silencers were also found, she said. A machine gun was discovered in the car he was driving.

The sheer size of the cache led authorities to believe “this individual was preparing to commit mass destruction,” Bhatia said.

Police said Kelly, 60, allegedly fired BB pellets and then shots at the glass door and a window of the Arizona Democrats’ Tempe field office in the early morning hours of Sept. 16, Sept. 23 and Oct. 6. No one was inside during the shooting.

Kelly is also accused of hanging several razor-bladed political signs on Tuesday in Ahwatukee, an affluent Phoenix suburb where most voters voted Democratic in recent elections.

Authorities said the hand-painted signs were posted on palm trees and appeared to criticize Democrats and their presidential candidate, Vice President Kamala Harris.

According to police, Kelly was being held on three counts of terrorist attacks and four other counts related to the shooting. A cash bond of $500,000 was set with conditions of house arrest and ankle monitoring if he can raise that amount.

His attorney, Jason Squires, said Kelly was a retired aerospace engineer who once had the highest security clearance, had no criminal record and was not a flight risk.

Kelly’s next appearance was scheduled for the morning of Oct. 29 in Maricopa County Superior Court.

The Tempe location was one of 18 Harris field offices in Arizona where Democrats gathered to organize Harris campaign efforts. It was closed after the latest shooting, police said.

Arizona is one of the battleground states where the competition between Harris and former President Donald Trump was particularly intense.

Political violence has already overshadowed the election campaign for the Republican presidential candidate Become a victim of assassination attempts at a campaign rally and at one of Trump’s golf courses in Florida.