Police arrested a New Jersey man in Washington, D.C., on Sunday who was accused of stashing over 200 “fully functional” grenades in his tent.
Louis Geri, who appeared to be homeless, was apprehended outside St. Matthew’s Cathedral in Northwest Washington hours before an annual Red Mass ceremony marking the start of the Supreme Court’s fall term, according to authorities. Police said they discovered the destructive devices inside his tent, backpack, and pockets as they cleared the space outside the church early Sunday morning.
Geri was also found with documents showing animosity toward Jews, Catholics, Supreme Court members, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, according to records.
Geri planned to use modified bottle rockets to detonate them from a distance, according to documents seen by ABC 7. Police said he threatened to kill them and detonate the grenades as they attempted to clear the area around the cathedral over the weekend.
“You might want to stay back and call the federales, I have explosives,” Geri told officers when he was asked to leave the area, according to court records.
“Do you want me to throw one out? I’ll test one out in the street. I have a hundred plus of them,” the suspect said. “If you just step back, I’ll throw one in the street, no one will get hurt, there will be a hole in the street. … If you just step back, I’ll take out that tree. No one will get hurt, there will just be a hole where that tree used to be.”
“Several of your people are going to die from one of these,” Geri told police as they warned him he would be removed.
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The FBI is reviewing the items found on Geri, who has been charged with possession of a destructive device and false report of a weapon of mass destruction. He is being held in jail without bond.
The incident is the latest of targeted threats against religious institutions, including shootings at a Catholic church in Minneapolis and a Mormon church in Michigan. Three were killed at Minnesota’s Annunciation Church in August. Four died after a gunman targeted the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Grand Blanc last month.