OAK HARBOR — Police in Oak Harbor arrested a 27-year-old man on Friday after he made violent threats against a Pride event in a nearby city, authorities said.
Tyler Dinsmoor, of Oak Harbor, was arrested for civil rights malicious harassment with a hate crimes enhancement, the Oak Harbor Police Department said in a news release.
Over the last few days, he posted several online comments about killing LGBTQ people on gab.com, a Twitter-like platform popular among far-right extremists, authorities said. He appeared to specifically target Saturday’s Anacortes Pride Parade.
An arrest warrant had already been issued to Dinsmoor for a separate incident involving LGBTQ people, police said.
According to local television station KCPQ-TV, Dinsmoor was accused of making homophobic threats at a woman on June 14, yelling at her that “it used to be legal to kill gay people!”
The woman, who lives in North Whidbey with her wife and children, was especially frightened because she once saw Dinsmoor pointing a gun at the neighbor’s nephew, who is Black, as she told police.
He was charged with committing a hate crime, a felony charge, on June 15.
He was ultimately arrested Friday morning after making specific threats against the Pride parade in Anacortes, about 20 miles north of Oak Harbor.
The police report notes that earlier this week he posted that he “was 9mm away from fedposting” two gay people at a store, using the internet slang that denotes something posted online that shows premeditated planning of criminal activity.
“Pray for me bro,” the post continues, “I might not make it through this f–t month.”
According to the Whidbey News-Times, Dinsmoor was arrested in a massive operation that included “officers from seven law enforcement agencies, responders from two federal agencies, multiple armored vehicles, a negotiating team and a police helicopter.”
He surrendered without incident and was later taken to the Island County Jail where he will remain in custody pending a pretrial agreement, Oak Harbor Police Captain Tony Slowik said.
His bail is set at $1 million.
