In an email to the El Paso Times, received shortly before the Eagle Mountain incident, Craig wrote that he would “call 911 with a threat of an explosive and drive onto my 9yr olds elementary school, Eagle Valley Elementary, with a True Explosive”.
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According to Kimberly Bird, the Assistant to the Superintendent of the Alpine School District, a man in a mask went into the Eagle Valley Elementary School office just after 2 p.m. and said, “Evacuate the kids and no one will get hurt”.
The suspect is in custody, the Utah County Sheriff’s Department told KSTU.
A neighbour posted video of the arrest on Facebook.
The Times referred to Craig as a former University of Texas El Paso basketball player. The man then went outside the building again, Cannon said.
The message claimed that Chris Craig was his “slave name” and declared himself “The Radical Islamic Jihadist Muhammad Allah Al-Khidr”.
One school cafeteria worker didn’t hear the evacuation announcement and didn’t leave the school building, according to Cannon.
“It’s never going to make ideal sense”, Cannon said.
The email further meandered, “Racism is the reason for my hunger strike, to take this conversation deeper, to The Truth, Core, and roots”. In the article it stated he has been treated at state mental health hospitals in Colorado and Utah, and his brother said he has been diagnosed with schizophrenia. He has been questioned in the past by the Federal Bureau of Investigation after making posts on his blog about President Barack Obama being assassinated.
Craig is also the former head basketball coach at Utah State University Eastern and has a history of being arrested during incidents in which he has called himself an “Islamic jihadist”, the Salt Lake Tribune reported. However, the weird situation was still unfolding with reports of police snipers at the scene.
The man surrendered to police hours later.
Later that year, he was arrested in Price, Utah, on marijuana charges after raising law enforcement concerns because of freakish behavior, threats and a self-description as an “Islamist jihadist”.
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We’ll have more information as it becomes available.
