Police shot and killed a man who drew national headlines in 2016 for storming a Washington, D.C., pizzeria armed with several guns—part of an ill-fated attempt to prove an outlandish conspiracy theory involving Hilary Clinton.
Edgar Maddison Welch was shot and killed by police in Kannapolis, North Carolina, on Saturday night during a traffic stop, the city’s police department confirmed in a release sent to the Daily Beast.
Over eight years ago, Welch stormed into Comet Ping Pong carrying an AR-15 and a .38 caliber revolver, hoping to uncover a nonexistent pedophilia ring linked to Clinton. At the time, the conspiracy was popular in right-wing circles, concocted by QAnon, the sprawling extremist internet theory that Democrats operated a global sex trafficking ring and conspired against Donald Trump to cover up their tracks.
Welch ultimately fired one shot while inside the restaurant, though no one was injured as a result.
Welch later told The New York Times: “I just wanted to do some good and went about it the wrong way… I regret how I handled the situation.”
He pled guilty to charges of interstate transport of a weapon and ammunition and assault with a dangerous weapon in 2017. He was sentenced by future Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, then a district judge in D.C., to four years in prison. He was released from prison to a halfway house in 2020, the Washington Post reported.
Saturday’s incident began around 10 p.m. when officers pulled over an SUV with an outstanding warrant for a felony probation violation, Kannapolis police reported.
Welch was sitting in the passenger seat of the SUV, but was quickly identified by police as the subject of the warrants. Two additional officers arrived at the scene for backup, police said.
When one officer opened the passenger-side door to arrest Welch, he pulled out a handgun, police said.
The officers at the scene repeatedly told Welch to drop the gun, but he allegedly refused. Two of the three officers opened fire, striking him several times.
Welch was transported to Atrium-Cabarrus hospital for treatment, and later transferred to Atrium-Charlotte, where he died from his injuries. The SUV’s driver was uninjured in the shooting, police said.
The North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation is currently conducting a standard investigation into the shooting.
