Warning: This article contains language that may upset some readers.
Mack Davis of Owosso, Michigan, has admitted to planning a mass shooting at a local political party’s headquarters and a nearby bar because he allegedly associated both locations with gay people.
The 22-year-old pleaded guilty to one count of committing a hate crime for allegedly attempting to carry out mass killings.
According to prosecutors, from July 2023 to June 2024, Davis accessed search engines and social media sites to research, post about, and pay tribute to past killers, writing about dozens of them in personal journals and on other items in his home.
During that time, he also hatched a plan to carry out a mass killing, drafting lists of weapons and tactical gear that he would need to carry out his scheme.
By June 2024, Davis had crossed off every item on his list, amassing an arsenal that included two firearms, magazines, hundreds of rounds of ammunition, a crossbow and arrows, assorted bomb-making parts, smoke grenades, tactical gear and clothing, and several knives.
He inscribed one of the knives with the words “FAGGOT Killer.”
Davis posted on a social media site that he intended to commit a mass killing at the political party headquarters, arguing that it was “filled with far-left liberal, faggot scum.”
Davis also wrote he would continue his killing spree at a nearby “faggot bar.” He conducted physical surveillance of both locations and posted about his research on social media.
Davis also vandalized two cars belonging to his neighbors, whom he knew to be gay, by spray-painting the word “fag” on one of the cars.
Days later, he test-fired an illegal short-barreled rifle by firing approximately 60 bullets into several of his neighbors’ properties, including one of the vandalized cars.
Owasso Police arrested Davis for that shooting. He was later transferred to federal custody, where he has remained since.
Because Davis’s hate crime involved an attempt to kill, he faces a maximum penalty of life in prison. He will be sentenced by a federal district court judge at a date yet to be determined.
“Davis’s plans were chilling,” U.S. Attorney Dawn Ison said in a statement. “He intended to commit mass shootings at two locations — destroying countless lives and devastating our community — all because of his fanatical hatred for gay people.”
“This kind of vile and heinous hate-fueled violence, intended to target innocent people based on their sexual orientation, runs contrary to our values as Americans,” Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke, of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, said in a statement.
Davis’s attorney, Bryan Sherer, told NBC News his client is “just twenty-two years old and vulnerable.”
“Mr. Davis did not intentionally harm anyone despite having multiple opportunities to do so,” Sherer wrote to the news organization in an email. “The information that was found by the police was found in Mr. Davis’s private journal inside his bedroom…. He does not have a history of violent behavior toward others .”
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