TEMPE, Ariz. (AP) — An Arizona prosecutor said the man arrested in the three-time shooting of 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 initial court appearance on Wednesday that federal agents told her about the large seizure made after Kelly’s arrest.
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 person was preparing to commit an act of mass casualty,” Bhatia said.
Police said Kelly, 60, allegedly fired BB pellets and then gunshots at the glass front door and a window of the Arizona Democrats’ field office in Tempe in the early morning hours of Sept. 16, Sept. 23 and Oct.
6. Nobody was inside during the shootings. Kelly is also accused of hanging several political signs lined with razor blades on Tuesday in Ahwatukee, an affluent suburb of Phoenix where most voters have chosen Democrats in recent elections.
Authorities said the hand-painted signs were attached to palm trees and appeared to criticize Democrats and their presidential nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris. Kelly was being held on three felony counts of acts of terrorism and four other counts related to the shootings, according t.
