St. Louis couple who pointed guns at protesters have a history of suing neighbors

Mark and Patricia McCloskey, the St. Louis couple who pointed guns at protesters, have a long history of suing their neighbors, a lengthy investigation by the St. Louis Post-Dispatch found.

The newspaper found that the two personal injury lawyers have been in litigation with their gated neighborhood almost continually since they moved into their home in 1988, which they obtained after winning a lawsuit.

The McCloskeys filed suits over small neighborhood issues, including accusing neighbors of breaking neighborhood rules by allowing an unmarried gay couple to live there. The McCloskeys appealed all the way to the state Supreme Court.

The couple also reportedly sued a synagogue near their home for setting up beehives on their property to harvest honey for Rosh Hashanah celebrations. Mark McCloskey allegedly smashed the beehives, and the children in the synagogue cried the next day, the congregation’s rabbi told the Post-Dispatch.

In 1996, the McCloskeys also filed two lawsuits in the same day — one against a neighborhood association and another against a dog breeder who allegedly sold them a German shepherd without documentation — saying in the deposition that he “saved gas” by making only one trip.

Over the span of two years, the McCloskeys reportedly evicted two tenants from a modular home they own. The first was a single woman with three children who they claimed had one rent check that bounced. The woman told the Post-Dispatch that she did not ever miss rent and that when she showed up in court for the eviction hearing, Mark McCloskey allegedly told her she had no chance of winning, so she left.

The second tenant reportedly failed to pay rent in April and May and was served a $8,299 judgment. The Post-Dispatch noted that the same day the tenant left the rental, the McCloskeys had their encounter with protesters.

“My life has been ruined,” Mark McCloskey told CNN host Chris Cuomo two days later.

The couple made headlines after they pointed guns at a swath of Black Lives Matter demonstrators on June 28 who were en route to Mayor Lyda Krewson’s (D) home to call for her resignation because of comments she made during a livestreamed briefing.

On Friday, St. Louis authorities executed a search warrant of the McCloskeys’ home, with a local news station reporting that law enforcement seized the rifle that Mark McCloskey was seen holding the day of the protests.