By Ian Cummings | The Kansas City Star
[Editor’s Note: We received multiple comments on this news link about this disturbing story out of Kansas City. Thank you for your contribution.]
Overland Park police said Tuesday they are aware that a Kansas Civil Air Patrol commander [of the 77th Composite Squadron] has been identified as the person who sent a threatening message to a Johnson County lawmaker on social media.
Earlier this month Lt Col Jonathan A. Holder, commander of a Civil Air Patrol squadron based in Emporia, posted a Facebook comment saying Rep. Stephanie Clayton, an Overland Park Republican, should “swing from a tree.” The squadron was made up of 10 senior officers and five cadets.
Holder said he made the comment and stood by it, the Topeka Capital-Journal reported on Tuesday. Holder did not immediately respond to messages from The Star seeking comment.
Holder wrote the comment under a Facebook post Clayton shared about a bill she introduced that would permanently exempt Kansas colleges from having to allow concealed handguns on campus.
Holder responded with the comment “This bitch needs to swing from a tree for violating her oath.”
Clayton alerted Capitol Police and the Overland Park Police Department. She could not be reached for comment Tuesday afternoon.
An Overland Park police detective is investigating, according to Officer John Lacy, a spokesman for the department. The detective was already aware of the commenter’s identity and is doing follow-up work on the investigation, Lacy said.
Related Stories:
• Civil Air Patrol Commander Accused of Threatening KS Rep
• Kansas Civil Air Patrol Officer Calls for Legislator’s Death
• Civil Air Patrol Officer Reinstated After Hanging Post
• Kansas Rep. Clayton says Person Who Posted Threats Over Campus Gun Bill
• Rampant Abuse in Kansas Wing
Contributors to the CAP controlled CAPTalk forum are suggesting that your News Aggregation site is “mostly made-up stories or extremely slanted interpretations of events, run by (surprise, surprise) a former CAP member with an axe to grind.”
However, this story is taken from The Kansas Star.
One of Lt Col Holder’s roles was to provide training, mentoring and supervision to Civil Air Patrol cadets in a program that emphasizes, among other things, leadership and communication.
It is a harsh reminder to cadet parents: We must pay attention to the values and actions of the CAP leaders who are charged with teaching our children. It was a disgusting, menacing remark. It’s long past time to discuss these issues without threatening and insulting one another. We have to figure out a way to discuss combustible issues like gun control in a civil, productive way.
I have to speak up on this one… I don’t know if the commander is a complete waste of life, or the next coming of Christ (or whoever you want) but the statement in quotes is NOT a threat.
“This bitch needs to swing from a tree for violating her oath.”
There is NOTHING, not one single word of intent, this is an opinion and if it was me who said it, I would stand behind it too… NOTHING in this is a threat – and, case law is very clear on this… this statement is not politically correcting in today’s world, but it is nothing even remotely close to a physical threat.
LMAO over this. a lt colonel even. so the staff colleges and the command interviews and the finger print and the wing commander oversight didn’t catch his attitude issues? let us see what spin our ego centric “leaders” will put on this one. tooooooooo funnnnnny! line up at the spin booth for this one and let us recruit more members.
Many of us posted comments on the source article in the online version of the Kansas City Star. We directed their readers to AuxBeacon because of the work you are doing “aggregating CAP” for Congress and Federal Law Enforcement.
Soon after we did this, your site became inaccessible. You may want to check your logs to see if you suffered a Distributed Denial of Service attack between 3:00PM and 6:00PM and then probe the attacking IP address.
Why would there need to be a week-long investigation over this obvious infraction?
The Civil Air Patrol announced today, that Holder resigned “his command”.
Why didn’t the organization TERMINATE him from the program?
Could Jonathan A. Holder be a part of an inner CAP circle that has incriminating evidence on higher ups in the program? I know for a fact he is and that he does.
The Civil Air Patrol has a unique internal structure that protects offenders… look up Scott Higgins on the Auxiliary Beacon. He is still in charge of Cadets for the State.