Left: Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump speaks as members of the Penn State wrestling team listen at a campaign rally at the Bryce Jordan Center, Saturday, Oct. 26, 2024, in State College, Pa. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke). Right: Paul J. Gavenonis (Centre County Prison).
One day before Donald Trump’s rally in State College, Pennsylvania, at Penn State University, a local 74-year-old man was arrested and accused of threatening the former president while buying a parking pass for a commuter lot.
The suspect, identified as Paul J. Gavenonis, was arrested on Oct. 25, Friday afternoon, after an employee reported what he allegedly said to law enforcement, the Penn State Police crime log shows.
Cops said the employee reported the encounter with Gavenonis some 12 minutes after it took place.
WTAJ, citing a probable cause affidavit, reported that a PSU Transportation Office employee was the one who made the report and recounted Gavenonis showing up to buy a parking pass, bringing up the Saturday rally-to-be at the at the Bryce Jordan Center on campus, saying “I hate Donald Trump” and “I’d like to shoot that guy” — while allegedly motioning as if he was racking a gun.
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The report said that Gavenonis, when speaking with cops and the U.S. Secret Service, didn’t do himself any favors.
He allegedly said “[f]rankly, I hope somebody would get him,” told the Secret Service he did have a rifle at his home, and stated he “probably” could carry out a rally attack.
As a result, Gavenonis was arrested and charged with making terroristic threats causing serious public inconvenience and disorderly conduct, both misdemeanors.
Under Pennsylvania law as applied to this case, terroristic threats are made when a person “communicates, either directly or indirectly, a threat to […] otherwise cause serious public inconvenience, or cause terror or serious public inconvenience with reckless disregard of the risk of causing such terror or inconvenience.”
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The docket sheet in Gavenonis’ case specifically says that he’s “alleged to have threatened” Trump, is considered “suicidal,” and that he is being held without bail at Centre County Prison.
A preliminary hearing is set for 8:30 a.m. on Wednesday, records say.
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