A 26-year-old member of the Ohio National Guard has been arrested and charged with making a terrorist threat to the Anheuser-Busch plant in Columbus, Ohio.
According to the Columbus Dispatch, James Meade II was arrested Monday by members of the Ohio Highway Patrol at his home in Chesterhill, around 90 miles southeast of Columbus. WBNS reported that police previously issued a warrant for Meade’s arrest and charged him with making a terroristic threat based on social media posts from December 2021.
Meade said on the social media app Discord that he wanted to steal a plane and crash a plane into the plant, located on Schrock Road.
Anheuser-Busch’s Columbus plant began operations in 1968 and it was the sixth of the Missouri-based company’s 12 breweries to be built. It is currently capable of brewing 10 million barrels of beer.
Brands brewed at the location include: Budweiser, Bud Light, Bud Light Lime, Bud Ice, Bud Light Platinum, Budweiser Select, Budweiser Select 55, Busch, Busch Light, Natural Light, Natural Ice, Michelob, Michelob Light, Michelob ULTRA, Michelob Amber Bock, Landshark, O’Douls, O’Douls Amber, Busch NA and Rolling Rock. It is one of two Anheuser-Busch breweries to brew non-alcoholic beers.
“I hope they got a terrorism insurance plan the day before,” Meade said in his post, according to court documents cited by WBNS.
After seeing Meade’s post in group chats, a woman alerted law enforcement and the National Guard.
A spokesperson from the Ohio National Guard said Meade was most recently stationed in McConnelsville as an air defense battle management system operator. He first enlisted in 2017.
Members of the Ohio Highway Patrol; the patrol's special response team; the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives; and the Southern Ohio Fugitive Apprehension Strike Team, or SOFAST, aided in Meade’s arrest, according to Charles Sanso, a deputy supervisor for the U.S. Marshals Service who oversees SOFAST.
Related
Related
