DUNEDIN, Fla. — Sheriff’s deputies conducting a child-porn raid on a Florida home Wednesday found an arsenal of guns and explosives and a homemade silencer, along with a note promising “bloody revenge.”
Investigators found the weapons — including an AK-47 rifle, a .50-caliber pistol, a baseball bat with nails jutting out and 2,300 rounds of ammunition — in a locked closet in the Dunedin, Fla., home where 24-year-old Randall Drake lived with his parents, Pinellas County Sheriff Bob Gualtieri said.
During a news conference Thursday night, Gualtieri said that even more “troubling” is that investigators found aerial images of two schools and a water treatment plant in nearby Tampa. There was also the note written by Drake that promised he’ll have his “bloody revenge” and “the world will burn burn.”
“I don’t know what his plan was,” Gualtieri said. “He had all kinds of books and all kinds of gunpowder and if he had taken those devices put them in something else and put a bunch of nails and screws and other things, he could have caused some serious damage. Because it’s the shrapnel that hurts and kills everybody.”
The sheriff said he notified law enforcement and school officials in Hillsborough County, but so far investigators believe Drake was working alone.
His parents told authorities that they didn’t know what he kept in his locked closet, the sheriff said. Drake had no criminal history.
Gualtieri compared Drake to Las Vegas gunman Stephen Paddock in the way he seemed to be acting alone.
The note deputies found in Drake’s bedroom read: “My fury at those who imprisoned me shall be vast and without mercy. I shall have my bloody revenge, and then the world will burn burn.”