On Tuesday (December 15), Former Houston, Texas Police Chief Mark Anthony Aguirre was taken into custody following an election conspiracy crusade that ended in an innocent man being held at gunpoint.
According to a report by ABC 13, the 63-year-old ran a man off the highway by ramming his SUV into the back of his truck. The man he suspected of orchestrating a ballot fraud scheme turned out to be an air conditioner repair technician.
Aguirre pointed a gun at the head of the repairman, identified only as “DL” in court documents, in a pre-meditate plot to prove the man was hiding 750,000 ballots in his truck.
While Aguirre put his knee in DL’s back, other suspects, who have not been identified, searched the truck, finding only air conditioner parts. When police arrived on the scene, DL consented to a search of his truck and residence, where no ballots were found.
The former police chief raised suspicions about DL to authorities back in October, and requested he be detained. When police refused, citing no evidence to corroborate Aguirre’s allegations, the former police chief said he would conduct a “citizen's arrest” himself.
For four days, Aguirre had the repairman under surveillance, according to an affidavit. In the court documents, Aguirre told police he believed the man was committing voter fraud by using the names of Hispanic children who he believed wouldn’t show up in any voter registration databases, a scheme he believed was funded by Facebook CEO Mark Zuckenburg.
In actuality, Aguirre received a $266,400 payment from a group called the Liberty Center for God and Country. Steven Hotze, the group’s leader, told the news outlet that they don’t endorse Aguirre’s actions and that they would “be looking into it.”
Aguirre is currently in jail and faces up to 20 years if convicted of the second-degree aggravated assault with a deadly weapon charge.
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