Man Arrested in Connection to Threat to Kidnap the Mayor of Wichita Over Face Mask Ordinance

By Zack Linly, The Root

19 October 20

hat’s it: America officially produces the weirdest terrorists.

On Friday, police in Wichita, Ks., arrested a man for threatening to kidnap and kill Wichita Mayor Brandon Whipple. In case you’re wondering to yourself, “What egregious acts of oppression are leadership in Wichita imposing on their citizens to prompt such passionate contempt for the city’s mayor?”—don’t worry because it isn’t actual oppression, it’s wypipo oppression, so: “oppression.”

According to KSHB 41, 59-year-old Meredith Dowty is accused of being yet another deranged anti-masker who thinks he’s the Rosa Parks of John Waynes rising up against tyrannical governments and their...mask mandates put in place to keep the public as safe as possible during an ongoing global health crisis.

From KSHB

Meredith Dowty was arrested Friday and charged with making a criminal threat after officials were “alerted to threatening statements directed toward city of Wichita Mayor Brandon Whipple,” according to a news release from the Wichita Police Department.

Dowty was booked at 6:05 p.m. on Friday with no bail amount set, according to Sedgwick County Sheriff’s Office booking details.

Whipple told CNN he gets threats periodically, but the details of “this one seemed different.” He said a detective called him and read the text messages that were “sent to someone else who knew this person but also knew me.”

The Wichita Police Department said the investigation is ongoing and will be presented to the Sedgwick County District Attorney’s Office.

“Obviously, the person was very angry, but also very detailed in what it sounded like they wanted to do,” Whipple said. “They wanted the address, my address. ... And also, this threat was more specific about kidnapping me and cutting my throat. Those were what was read to me. They were graphic. Luckily, our police force was able to track this person down and interview them and apparently they have arrested them.”

He also mentioned that he hopes the threat against him isn’t part of an organized attack and that it’s “just a single person who is a little deranged.”

Whipple might have been thinking about the band of Vanilla ISIS morons whose alleged plot to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer was thwarted by the FBI recently. That weird-ass Die Hard sequel plot was also at least in part over Michigan’s COVID-19 ordinances, according to an FBI affidavit.

As for Dowty a.k.a. No-Sama bin Whining, according to the Wichita Eagle, turns out he’s a local musician and a cop-saving local hero.

From the Eagle:

The suspect is a well-known local musician who performs under the name “Cathead” and has played numerous gigs in the Wichita bar and nightclub scene, said Joe Stumpe, a musician and former Eagle reporter.

He plays guitar and harmonica, Stumpe said.

Dowty is a retired Wichita city firefighter who was honored by the Wichita City Council in 2008 for his role in saving the life of a Wichita police officer who was shot in the line of duty.

He was also one of the first rescuers on the scene at the 1998 explosion of the DeBruce Grain Elevator south of Wichita, which killed seven and injured 10 employees. Dowty was lifted to the top of the damaged elevator and helped remove four people who had suffered serious burns.

On Friday, Whipple took to Twitter to thank people for keeping him and his family in their thoughts as well as the “brave men & women of the @WichitaPolice who protect not just us, but our entire community.”

He also had a message for Dowty and anyone else who might turn violent over his face mask ordinance.

“Violence is never a way to settle disagreements,” Whipple tweeted. “We’re always stronger together as a City even when times are at their toughest. Tensions [may be] high, but we will get through this together as Wichitans.”