A man police say is obsessed with Barbara Bush has been charged with threatening her father, former President George W. Bush.
Benjamin Smith was found with a rifle, a machete and gasoline in his car in midtown Manhattan, police say, where he allegedly yelled “Bush will get his” after being arrested, reports the Associated Press.
Police tracked his cell phone after his mother allegedly found a threatening note at their shared home in upstate New York that said, “I’m going to work for George W. Bush and the pentagon. I have to slay a dragon and Barbara Bush is mine.”
Smith was asked in questioning about his marital status and he responded “I am divorced and not currently seeing anyone but I am working on a relationship with Barbara Bush.”
It’s a federal crime to threaten any current or former U.S. president, but a judge at a preliminary hearing Friday said he was unsure if a jury would find Smith guilty.
“Admittedly, there is some inconsistency in the notion that the way to win Barbara Bush’s affections is to kill her father,” U.S. Magistrate Judge Henry Pitman said, according to Reuters.
[AP]