A person threatened to launch a subway bloodbath within the Huge Apple, claiming he’d shoot “anyone I see” and kill dozens of straphangers — however was busted the day earlier than he vowed to tug off the bloodshed, authorities say
Robert Trout III, a 19-year-old New York native who at present lives in St. Petersburg, Fla., allegedly boasted on-line that he would shoot up New York Metropolis’s subways on Thanksgiving, saying he had 60 bullets and “that’s 60 pictures. That’s 60 individuals lifeless.
“For those who’re from New York Metropolis don’t take the prepare on Thursday night, bro,” Trout ominously wrote earlier than the vacation, saying he was able to “trigger havoc,” the US Legal professional’s Workplace from the Center District of Florida stated in a press launch Friday.
The feds stated Trout even displayed “a number of firearms” in the course of the Instagram rants, together with two semiautomatic weapons with prolonged clips with .40-caliber ammunition.
The troubled teen by no means had an opportunity to observe by on his disturbing alleged threats. He was busted by the FBI and the Pinellas County Sheriff’s Workplace on Nov. 22, only a day earlier than Thanksgiving, and charged with “knowingly transmitting in interstate commerce a real risk,” the Tampa Bay Occasions reported.
Trout is from New York and deliberate to maneuver again, his household informed the outlet.
The teenager has a historical past of substance abuse, the Occasions stated.
Trout is at present awaiting trial on a separate hid weapon cost in Pinellas County for allegedly carrying a switchblade after cops stated he stole a shirt at a neighborhood Walmart
He was additionally arrested in February 2022 and accused of pointing a gun at one other man throughout a dispute. The costs have been later dismissed after Trout agreed to enter a pretrial diversion program, the outlet stated.
His Instagram posts have been taken down since his arrest.
Trout made his first court docket look on the brand new cost in federal court docket in Tampa on Thursday and was ordered held with out bail pending his subsequent court docket look Dec. 18. He faces as much as 5 years behind bars if convicted of the rap.
In an announcement Saturday, the MTA stated the suspect’s threats to the subways weren’t “credible.
“The NYPD and federal regulation enforcement authorities made clear previous to and on Thanksgiving that there have been no particular credible threats to New York Metropolis, together with to the transit system,” company spokeswoman Joana Flores stated in an announcement.
“We’re grateful to policing professionals right here, and throughout the nation, for the work they do to maintain New Yorkers protected,” Flores stated.
The NYPD stated Sunday solely that it’s conscious of the threats and Trout’s arrest.