An armed man who tried to breach the main gate at Little Rock Air Force Base on Monday and was shot by security personnel died from his injuries Tuesday evening, the FBI reported.
Larry Dean McElroy Jr., 43, was pronounced dead at UAMS Medical Center shortly before 9 p.m., according to an FBI news release. The agency reported McElroy's death Wednesday morning.
McElroy, who lived just north of the base at 4120 W. Maddox Road, was shot Monday morning when he attempted to illegally enter the base gate on Vandenberg Boulevard in Jacksonville, base officials said. About 9:15 a.m., he reportedly drove a Ford Expedition over a curb, struck a road sign and got out of the vehicle holding a rifle.
Pulaski County sheriff's office reports, taken over the past nine years, show that McElroy was known to officers because of his paranoia and drug use. He had hallucinations and believed military personnel were spying on him, the reports state.
Debra Green, a spokesman for the FBI's Little Rock field office, has said the agency and Little Rock Air Force Base were aware of McElroy's history.
McElroy's wife of 18 years, Misty Chambers, said in a phone interview Wednesday that two base guards shot her husband in the head, foot and leg. She said he was carrying a .22-caliber rifle but didn't fire the weapon because he "wouldn't hurt nobody."
Chambers also answered questions regarding her husband's mental health. She said he believed he was a victim of "electronic harassment," the purported use of electromagnetic waves to transmit sounds and thoughts into someone's mind.
Chambers said McElroy had written letters to the White House about electronic harassment and had wanted to appear on Fox News and the Dr. Phil television show to "spread awareness." He believed government agents were going to hurt his wife and others, she said.
"He was just scared," Chambers said, sobbing. "Because that's what 'they' told him. He just wanted to protect me and protect anybody he could. He's not a bad man."
Chambers said she was asleep when McElroy went to the air base Monday morning. She said she awoke when federal authorities and the Little Rock Fire Department bomb squad arrived to search their home.
"I woke up and he was gone, and they were here, and the FBI is involved. They didn't know I was in the house because I was asleep, and when I woke up, they had their guns drawn on me because they didn't know if I had a bomb or what ... and I didn't know what Larry had just done," Chambers said.
The air base was on lockdown for more than three hours after Monday's shooting. Jacksonville police diverted traffic from the surrounding streets while FBI agents and the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives investigated the case.
Authorities used a remote-controlled bomb-disposal robot to search McElroy's vehicle near the base gate. No explosives were found in the Expedition or at McElroy's home.
The FBI has stated that McElroy acted alone and had no ties to terrorism.
Green did not return phone calls Wednesday seeking an update on the agency's investigation.
The base returned to its normal security measures Tuesday. The two guards who shot at McElroy were not injured. They reportedly received on-base counseling and returned to their posts.
Base officials have declined to comment on McElroy's complaints about the facility.
Chambers said that although the media had portrayed her husband as "crazy," he was "a wonderful uncle" to four nephews and three nieces, and he loved dogs. McElroy was thrifty and often worked on small engines, she said, but he hadn't found steady work as a self-employed handyman.
McElroy had not spoken to a doctor about the electronic harassment, according to Chambers. She said people had said he might be schizophrenic, but she didn't believe that was possible because he'd shown no signs of such a condition until they moved near Little Rock Air Force Base.
She added that electronic harassment is plausible and well-documented by various online communities.
"It sounds crazy, but if you could do some research on it yourself and kind of educate yourself on it, it can be done," she said. "We live here by the air base, but it doesn't have to be an air base. It can be individuals."
Chambers said there's a cellphone tower in her backyard, through which she believes electronic harassment likely occurred. She said it led to her dog having seizures and eventually having to be euthanized.
Deputies spoke to McElroy in January after he said he'd purchased a listening-device locator on the Internet and found three "spying devices" in his home, a sheriff's office report states. McElroy told deputies that he believed "General N.B. Forrest and Colonel Sanders from the Little Rock Air Force base" had planted the devices in his home.
In January of last year, deputies were called to McElroy's home after he said 25 armed men in uniform had held him and Chambers captive for 10 hours. McElroy's father, Larry McElroy Sr., told the sheriff's office that it wasn't the first time his son had "fits of hallucinations."
On Wednesday, Chambers called the January 2014 occurrence a "misunderstanding."
"There was people around, but it wasn't hallucinations. I think it had something to do with the electronic harassment. I don't know," she said.
Court records show that McElroy and Chambers had financial troubles in recent years, and the sheriff's office said the couple's arguments over money led to at least one of four domestic disturbances that had been reported at the home.
On one occasion, according to the reports, McElroy asked to be hospitalized because "he was afraid for his safety" and "people were watching him," but Chambers said they couldn't afford to have him transported by ambulance. She said that day that she would drive him to a hospital.
The couple declared Chapter 13 bankruptcy in December 2010, months after judges ruled against the two in civil suits filed by Metropolitan National Bank and CitiBank. The banks had been seeking to collect a total of $28,006 in debt.
McElroy and Chambers had purchased the one-story home on West Maddox Road for $35,000 in 2004. They received a $109,285 mortgage loan through the Federal Housing Administration the following year.
"The past couple years, we've been struggling trying to make it," Chambers said.
Chambers said she plans to donate her husband's organs.
"I want some good to come out of this ... he would want to save somebody and to help somebody else live," she said.
Metro on 06/18/2015