A man was arrested late last week for planning a “mass casualty event” at Tesla’s headquarters in Texas during an event to celebrate the much anticipated release of the electric car company’s new Cybertruck, according to law enforcement officials.
A SWAT team tracked down and arrested 28-year-old Paul Ryan Overeem at a McDonald’s parking lot and arrested him after he allegedly threatened to attack the event in messages he wrote on social media.
Tesla was notified on November 10 about the messages and they subsequently contacted local law enforcement officials who then began investigating, according to the Austin American-Statesman.
Overeem allegedly wrote the following messages on Instagram:
- “I sure am crazy though”
- “But yeah so at the Tesla event I’m planning an attach [sic] so up to you guys to stop me”
- “I plan on killing people at that even ok November 30th and I would like you to do something about it so I don’t have to”
- “I wanna die. My thoughts haven’t been free for over a year. All the electronics around me”
- “I need to be stopped”
- “If I’m saying I’m gonna kill people then you should take this seriously”
When SWAT officers arrested him, he allegedly said that he had weapons in his car and that he was going to commit suicide before he could be arrested. “I was going to shoot up Elon Musk and the plant,” he said.
The suspect was charged in Travis County on suspicion of making a terrorist threat, a third-degree felony. He is being held in jail after not posting the $300,000 bond.