Ryan Wesley Routh, the suspected gunman involved in an apparent assassination attempt on former president Donald Trump at the Trump International Golf Club in Florida on Sunday, was charged with possession of a weapon of mass destruction over 20 years ago.
“I figured he was either dead or in prison by now,” Tracy Fulk, the charging officer in the case, tells WIRED. “I had no clue that he had moved on and was continuing his escapades.”
According to court records from the Guilford District Court in North Carolina obtained by WIRED, Routh was arrested by the Greensboro Police Department on December 16, 2002.
Local reporting from Greensboro News and Record in 2002 states that Routh was pulled over by police during a traffic stop. Routh then drove to the business United Roofing, where he proceeded to barricade himself for three hours, the police said at the time.
Fulk says he was well known in the area, and that police would get alerts about him allegedly related to, as she remembers, weapons and explosives.
“One night I recognized him in his vehicle,” she says. “I knew he didn’t have a driver’s license, so I stopped him right in front of his roofing shop, which was what used to be on Lee Street in Greensboro. He stopped, and as I approached his truck he pulled a sack away from the center of the seat, and I saw a gun. So of course I drew my gun and started saying, ‘Hey! Show me your hands, show me your hands.’ And he just basically pulled into his driveway and ran into his house. So we ended up having a [Special Response Team] callout and a big standoff for a couple of hours before they went in and we arrested him.”
Routh was charged with possession of a fully automatic machine gun, referred to in court filings as a weapon of mass destruction. He was also charged with carrying a concealed weapon, as well as driving without a valid license and resisting, delaying, and obstructing law enforcement, according to Greensboro News and Record.
While the disposition of the case isn’t entirely clear, Routh did plead guilty to carrying a concealed gun.
Trump was not harmed on Sunday while playing golf. Law enforcement apprehended Routh after a Secret Service agent spotted a rifle sticking out of a perimeter fence on the course and engaged with the threat, firing at least four rounds in that direction. It’s unclear whether the gunman fired a shot. Law enforcement later found an AK-47 style rifle with a scope and a GoPro in the bushes.
