A Texas mother was arrested for reportedly buying and supplying her 14-year-old son with ammunition and tactical gear despite allegedly knowing he was planning “mass targeted violence” at his school, prosecutors claimed.
Ashley Pardo, 33, was said to have “intentionally and knowingly aided” her son’s goals to carry out a mass casualty attack. In exchange, the mother was said to have received childcare for her youngest children.
Pardo’s son reportedly entered Jeremiah Rhodes Middle School in San Antonio on Monday "wearing a mask, camouflage jacket and tactical pants but left shortly after", police said. Before entering the school, he reportedly told his grandmother he was “going to be famous.”
Police later detained the minor off-campus and Pardo was arrested that same day.
"The student was detained off-campus and charged with terrorism," the school said in a note to parents. The note also referenced some posts made by the boy online.
The arrest reportedly came after a tip-off from the boy’s grandmother, who told police that Pardo had purchased a gun for the boy. She also claimed she had walked in on him playing with live ammunition and a hammer, according to a police affidavit. The grandmother was also said to have found a firework fastened into a homemade explosive, which had scribed on it the name of the man who attacked a mosque in 2019, ‘SS’ symbols, and the white supremacist ‘14 words’.
The grandmother, according to BBC News, also informed police that Pardo had taken her son to a military surplus store to purchase tactical gear, including ammunition magazines, a tactical vest and a helmet.
A 'fascination with past mass shooters'
The ammunition purchases and private statements to his grandmother were reportedly only the latest in a string of behaviours that concerned school officials.
Prosecutors claimed that school officials discovered in January a map the boy had drawn of the school labeled “suicide route.” He had reportedly told staff at the time that he had a "fascination with past mass shooters, including their manifestos".
Four months later, the student was reportedly suspended for using school property to research mass shooting attacks.
He was "subsequently suspended and later in the day attempted suicide with a straight razor, causing significant injuries and requiring over 100 stitches," the affidavit noted.
"The Defendant expressed to the school her support of (her son's) violent expressions and drawings and does not feel concerned for his behavior," the court document claimed of Pardo.
Pardo has since been charged with one count of aiding in the commission of terrorism but was released on bail on Tuesday after posting $75,000 bail. Her son remains in the custody of the Bexar County Juvenile Detention Facility.