UPDATEDÂ at noon Wednesday with statements from lawmakers.
JEFFERSON CITY — Gov. Mike Parson has pardoned a couple who pointed guns at protesters passing their Central West End home last summer, the governor’s office announced Tuesday afternoon.
Mark McCloskey and Patricia McCloskey pleaded guilty in June to misdemeanor charges, and each were to pay fines without facing jail time. The governor has made repeated statements saying he would pardon the couple.
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The pair emerged from their home on a private street on June 28, 2020, and held guns as a crowd of protesters passed on their way to then-Mayor Lyda Krewson’s house. The couple said the protesters were trespassing on their private street.
ºüÀêÊÓƵ Circuit Attorney Kimberly M. Gardner initially charged the couple with felony gun crimes, but she was disqualified from prosecuting the couple after the McCloskeys were mentioned in her campaign material. Former U.S. Attorney Richard Callahan was appointed special prosecutor in the case.
Callahan said his investigation determined that the protesters were peaceful.
“There was no evidence that any of them had a weapon and no one I interviewed realized they had ventured onto a private enclave,†Callahan said in a news release after the McCloskeys pleaded guilty.
Mark McCloskey announced in May that he’s running for U.S. Senate as a Republican.
“They’re thrilled,†the couple’s attorney, Joel Schwartz, said Tuesday. “They want to put this episode of their lives behind them and focus on Mark’s campaign for Senate. As Mark McCloskey has stated, if he faced the same situation again, he would conduct himself in the same manner, and he feels he’s been vindicated by the governor’s pardon.â€
The McCloskeys later issued their own statement, thanking Parson for his support.
"We recognize there is still work to be done," Mark McCloskey said in the statement. "In our case, the circuit attorney raided our home a year ago and seized the guns we used to protect ourselves. We are calling on the General Assembly to protect Missourians' constitutional rights and pass legislation fixing this broken piece of law.â€
Ten other people were also pardoned Friday by the governor, a Republican.
Parson’s legal team has been working through a backlog of clemency requests for months.
He hasn’t yet taken action on longtime inmate Kevin Strickland, who several prosecutors now say is innocent of a 1978 Kansas City triple homicide. Parson could pardon Strickland, but he has said he’s not convinced he is innocent.
State Rep. LaKeySha Bosley of ºüÀêÊÓƵ criticized Parson for pardoning the McCloskeys while not pardoning Strickland or Lamar Johnson, who has served 26 years in prison on a homicide conviction.
“While inmates like Kevin Strickland and Lamar Johnson have watched from prison for decades as life passed them by for crimes they did not commit, two unhinged, paranoid, delusional admitted criminals — one of them a Republican candidate for U.S. Senate — get pardoned by the governor less than a month after they pleaded guilty to pointing loaded firearms at peaceful protestors,†Bosley said in a statement.
Democratic state Rep. Crystal Quade, the House minority leader, said in her own statement that the governor's decision was "beyond disgusting."Â
The Associated Press contributed to this report.