A police officer in rural Virginia avoided using deadly force to take a naked mass murder suspect into custody today. Police say Matthew Thomas Bernard killed the mother, wife and child of a AA minor league pitcher for the Tampa Bay Rays organization, along with his (and the wife’s) mother.
Watching the apprehension, you can see for yourself how the officer probably regretted bringing his police patrol rifle into the situation.
Pro-tip: When confronted with a naked attacker while using pepper spray, don’t forget to douse the groin as well as the face.
The round-and-round went on long enough for the officer to run out of pepper juice. Which didn’t really have much of an effect on the lunatic pursuing the cop, no doubt intending on disarming the cop.
At one point, the crazed suspect attacked a bystander as well.
Naked homicide suspect captured after trying to flee from police
The sheriff’s office say he is a suspect in a triple homicide that included the wife and child of Blake Bivens, a pitcher with the Tampa Bay Rays. (Video: WSET)https://t.co/mF3Un1eZyr pic.twitter.com/tzKjKtfE8l
— NBC 15 News (@mynbc15) August 28, 2019
Here is the mugshot once he got to jail and the pepper spray washed off him.
From the NY Post:
Naked man busted for killing Rays prospect Blake Bivens’ family is mentally ill: relative
The Virginia man accused of murdering his mother, sister and nephew — the mother-in-law, wife and baby of a Tampa Bay Rays minor league pitcher — had been battling mental health issues and snapped after reaching a “breaking point,” a relative said.
A cousin of Matthew Thomas Bernard — who is facing three counts of first-degree murder — said the slayings stemmed from Bernard’s ongoing mental instability.
“Unfortunately he was suffering with mental illness and came to a breaking point,” Bernard’s cousin, Jenn Stallard, told DailyMail.com in a statement. “Matthew is my cousin and I will love him and be there for if I am ever able to because what the public has seen was not him at all and his family, we would never imagine this could have happened.”
Stallard said she was reluctant to share more as the tragedy was “still extremely fresh” for Blake Bivens, a 24-year hurler for the Rays’ AA affiliate, the Montgomery Biscuits. The pitcher reportedly learned of the slayings allegedly committed by his brother-in-law just hours before a doubleheader scheduled for Tuesday night in Tennessee.
This should have been a defensive gun use. Sadly, it wasn’t.