The Midweek #69: A Planned Mass Shooting That Did Not Happen

Is it news when a planned mass shooting actually never happens? Bad news travels fast. Good news, not so fast. I’d like to share one story about good people acting in the best interests of society.

Last week, I attended a criminal trial in the courtroom of U.S. District Judge Fred Biery in the new federal courthouse on West Nueva Street. The defendant, Jay Anthony Villarreal, faced a single count of Interstate Threatening Communication, a charge that doesn’t come close to describing what could have happened had good people not acted in a timely and selfless fashion.

Villarreal, 25, a resident of the small South Texas town of Hondo and an angry veteran who served in the U.S. Marines, headed east this time last year in a pickup truck loaded with semiautomatic weapons, a cache of extra ammunition, and a police radio while announcing in a series of Instagram videos his intention to “drop bodies” and violently overthrow the government. 

Villarreal posted a series of at least six videos on Instagram in which he openly declared his intention to attack unnamed federal officials while calling on his fellow ex-marines to take up arms and join him. You can watch the videos here.

Was Villarreal deluded in his quest? Deluded and dangerous: aggrieved, armed to the teeth, trained to kill, and determined to right all wrongs: senseless foreign military campaigns, his steep grocery expenses, his inability to buy a house, and the nameless powers in New York and Washington whose distant decisions left him filled with rage.

Meta, the owner of Instagram and Facebook, did not take down the videos or alert authorities, although Villarreal’s postings promising mass violence and recruiting others to his cause occurred over hours one night and the following morning.

The trial unfolded over three days before Judge Biery, the senior judge in the Western District of Texas. Many people’s image of jury trials comes from television, where all the players are good-looking, and developments unfold dramatically with surprising plot twists. That’s not real life. 

Judge Biery began proceedings by showing prospective jurors a solemn video that introduced them to all the mass cemeteries in the United Kingdom and continental Europe where the remains of tens of thousands of American soldiers are buried. Freedom comes at a price, Biery said, and the right to trial by one’s peers does not exist in many countries.

Assistant U.S. Attorneys Mark Roomberg and Kirk Mangels prosecuted the case. Both were methodical and well-prepared, serious and void of any theatrics. Dante Dominguez, who served as Villarreal’s lead defense attorney, did as good a job as could be done, given the evidence.

For those of us who will never shake the senseless loss of lives in Uvalde and Sutherland Springs mass shootings, word that yet another plot was hatched in South Texas was deeply unsettling. This time, however, two citizens who followed Villarreal on social media did the right thing and alerted authorities.

One was Henry Sprague, a fellow Marine veteran in Maryland, who alerted the FBI after seeing the posted Instagram videos. The other was Joshua Aiken, a Hondo resident who attended school with Villarreal and knew him when they both worked at the local H-E-B. After spending a night wondering what to do or say about the disturbing videos, and then attending Sunday church services with his wife, Aiken called the Hondo police. Not an easy thing to do in a small town.

Aiken’s testimony in court, in my opinion, proved convincing to jurors, as did the testimony of three FBI special agents: Kevin Corrigan, stationed in Tampa, Eric Schwethelm and Sam Ukeiley in the San Antonio office, and Hondo police sergeant Zachary Justice and officer Joe Sanchez.

The police and the FBI responded quickly, and Villarreal was arrested at his home, where his mother informed law enforcement authorities that her son would not cooperate with police. A search of his bedroom and the truck led them to the loaded AR-15 and two semiautomatic handguns, among other materials.

Villarreal would later say that he received a message from God while en route to his targets, telling him the time was not quite right for the overthrow of the government. I wondered instead if a dose of reality intruded, however briefly, on a dark and lonely interstate as Villarreal headed east on his solitary mission.

“(M)ultiple family members and friends sent messages to Villarreal while he was on his drive from Hondo to Washington, D.C., prompting him to turn around in the Beaumont area and return home on June 29…” U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Texas Justin R. Simmons stated in a press release. “Later that day, FBI agents searched Villarreal’s home, resulting in the discovery of two U.S. military smoke grenades—all in addition to the firearms and materials he had in his vehicle.”

He was arrested on July 2, a few days after his aborted drive to Washington, D.C., and to New York, where he intended to attack the Federal Reserve Bank. A jury found Villarreal guilty after three days of testimony and deliberation. He faces a maximum five-year prison term when he appears before Biery for sentencing in September.

Not a shot was fired. No one was hurt. A very public mass killing in the making was prevented. It’s worth remembering that the Uvalde mass murderer also was a disturbed young man whose grievances were signaled online and around town with peers, yet no one spoke up. Villarreal, who remains jailed, is no longer a threat. We can hope the system will provide him a path to rehabilitation.

“Thankfully, in this case, friends and family members recognized the veracity of the threat and contacted the FBI, preventing what could have been a mass casualty event,” Simmons stated. “Given the darkness that invades the minds of so many, and the prevalence of violent acts committed in the name of politics, it is more important now than ever to say something if you see something. That single decision can lead to a swift response and lives saved, as it did in this case. Special thanks to the FBI and Hondo Police for acting quickly and recognizing the seriousness of the situation.”

A crime that didn’t happen, even a planned mass shooting, might not be big news, but in a nation bitterly divided by partisan politics, there is value in reminding people that the system works when everyone plays their part. In this instance, it was two citizens, the Hondo Police Department, the FBI special agents, members of the U.S. Attorney’s Office who prosecuted the case, the jury, and Judge Biery’s courtroom staff. 

A special thanks to Judge Biery’s courtroom staff who tolerated my presence and many questions: Courtroom Deputy Jaemie Herndon; Paralegal Jay Gorner; Courtroom Security Officer Paul Smith; Video and Evidence Tech Joe Cantu; and Court Reporter April Balcombe.

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An Eye on Other “Local News"

The New York Post, Rupert Murdoch’s sensational tabloid newspaper, published a June 18 article headlined, “San Antonio Spurs owner quietly expands Hawaii cattle ranch to 900 acres in an $8M off-market deal.” The article reported that San Antonio’s Peter J. Holt, chairman and managing partner of Spurs Sports & Entertainment, was chasing land now instead of an NBA trophy, adding 100 acres to “his growing Big Island holdings.”

Two photos of Holt and another of Caterpillar equipment in Corpus Christi accompanied the article, along with a few snarky comments. Holt also serves as chairman of HoltCAT, the largest Caterpillar dealership in the country. The article noted, “Under Holt’s ownership, the Spurs captured five championships and became one of the league’s defining dynasties…”

Not true, any of it. We have a real example of “fake news” here. Holt didn’t buy acreage in Hawaii and he was not in his current role with the Spurs when those five championship trophies were won. It was Peter Holt, his father, and the former head of the Spurs, who stepped down from his leadership role more than 10 years ago, who was in charge when the Spurs won their five championships. And it is Peter Holt, the father, who has lived in Hawaii for a number of years and owns the land in question.

The New York Post article did not quote father or son or anyone with the Spurs, or even note whether such a comment was sought. Days later, the San Antonio Express-News piggy-backed on the false report in the New York Post and published a similar article on Monday. While the newspaper noted that the Spurs stated the story was untrue, the article repeated all the details in the Post article as if it were a legitimate news article. Did editors believe the New York Post or the Spurs? Hard to tell.

There is no indication journalists sought independent confirmation of the story. I’d say retractions are in order.

High-profile, wealthy business leaders here and elsewhere are being lumped together as greedy capitalists indifferent to the greater good. There certainly are despicable billionaires who do not pay their taxes and appear to live by a very different set of rules than the rest of us. That is a genuine problem and a growing one, but it doesn’t justify the vilification of everyone whose work generates significant wealth. 

This city’s nonprofit sector would collapse without the sustained support from some of San Antonio’s most successful business leaders and family charitable foundations. Much of this giving is done quietly and never makes the news. We do live in politically divisive times, and millions of middle-class and working-class families are experiencing acute financial stress. That’s a real societal problem, and it’s turning people against one another. We in the media should not add to the growing social rancor.