Portland Rioter Who Allegedly Threw Explosive Was Outed by Grandmother, Now She Scolds Him Big Time

AP Photo/Noah Berger
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Federal officers use crowd control munitions to disperse Black Lives Matter protesters outside the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse on Tuesday, July 21, 2020, in Portland, Ore. (AP Photo/Noah Berger)
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We brought you the story of the young rioter who allegedly threw an explosive at the federal courthouse in Portland early Tuesday morning. The rioter seems to jump up and down in celebration and then sprints off.

Then we reported how people nailed him because of a unique vest he had been wearing. He was seen protecting a naked woman with it and his grandmother had posted a review comment about the vest from the clothing site Hibbett, “I got this for my grandson who’s a protester downtown, he uses it every night and says it does the job.”) She also posted a photo of him wearing the vest with her comment.

That helped the feds catch him and Gabriel Agard-Berryhill, 18, was charged yesterday with using fire to maliciously damage the courthouse.

Now both Agard-Berryhill and his grandmother are talking about what happened.

According to the NY Post, Agard-Berryhill sent them the following text, before he was arrested later in the day.

“The device I’ve been accused of allegedly throwing was allegedly given to me by an unknown protestor with full face coverings,” he wrote. “I was allegedly told that it was a strobe firework that wouldn’t damage the building or harm anyone around it.”

He added: “Law enforcement has not contacted me for any alleged crime as of right now.”

Late that same night Agard-Berryhill told his probation officer he wanted to turn himself in. He was arrested by U.S. Marshals and booked into the Multnomah County Detention Center, according to the affidavit by a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agent.

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Really? Then why as he jumping up and down at the huge explosion and the flames?

His grandmother, Karla Fox, also spoke to the Post.

Turns out she’s a Trump supporter with lots of MAGA gear, but she apparently didn’t know what he had been doing.

Fox says when she saw the video she knew it was her grandson because she gave him the vest.

“I bought the vest for him after he found one online after getting hit with rubber bullets the night before at the protest,” Fox said.

But she says she didn’t know that there was nightly rioting. Apparently her grandson had told her just that he was “peacefully protesting” and “protected a girl” because he was the person in a viral video who protected a naked woman as she marched back and forth in front of police. Liberal media dubbed the girl “naked Athena” and compared her to the man who stood against Chinese tanks trying to enter Tiananmen Square before the massacre in 1989.

“I believed all his stories,” Fox says. “He said he was just hanging out at Riot Ribs [an anarchist food co-op] and doing peaceful things.”

“I don’t condone any of this,” Fox told The Post. “I am amazed at all of these events.”

She said in her last communication via text with her grandson, he asked her to delete the photo of him wearing the vest and to remove her comment about the purchase.

She apparently didn’t do so.

She posted on Twitter @TRUMPSGIRL2020 about a picture of him.

“This is my only grandson, I love him to death, and didn’t know he was going to do such a bad thing, I had been posting several things about the antifa and BLM, he knows I am against those riots bigtime … he chose his poison.”

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Good for her. It’s difficult enough to have a family member lie to you and put you in such a situation, not to mention do what he allegedly did. But she’s responded by basically being straight up honest with what went down.

Agard-Berryhill had a probation officer because he’s on probation for a prior felony conviction and he spent the last two years at the “Rogue Valley Youth Correctional Facility.”

She hadn’t realized it was her comment that helped lead to his arrest, “I love my grandson and pray for him to get the help he needs.”

He faces a possible twenty years, with a minimum of five, if he is convicted.

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