The 42-year-old gunman who tried to attack an FBI field office in Cincinnati on Thursday once served in the Navy and Florida National Guard, and had a top-secret security clearance for a nuclear submarine .
Ricky Shiffer, 42, who had been under FBI investigation for months, was killed in a shootout shortly after trying to enter the Ohio office with a nail gun while brandishing an AR-style rifle -15.
Shiffer had been an enlisted sailor aboard the attack submarine USS Columbia, a position that requires a secret clearance, the Wall Street Journal reported Friday afternoon. He served in the Navy from 1998 to 2003, according to the report.
Shiffer also served as an infantryman in the Florida National Guard from 2008 to 2011, according to the report. He deployed to Iraq in January 2010 and left the services months after returning from that one-year stint overseas.
Ricky Shiffer died in the shooting Thursday.
The FBI also said it had Shiffer on its radar for months in connection with the U.S. Capitol riot. But the Bureau added that it was not aware of any “specific and credible threats”.
Posts made by Shiffer on President Donald Trump’s Truth Social platform indicate that he decided to attack the Cincinnati FBI office in retaliation for the FBI raid on Trump’s Mar-a-Lago on Monday, he reported the Journal.
“People are that,” Shiffer wrote on Truth Social. “I hope a call to arms comes from someone more qualified, but if not, this is your call to arms from me. Leave work tomorrow as soon as the gun shop opens, the Army and Navy or the pawn shop, get what you need to be combat ready.”
The area of Chester Township, Ohio, near where the confrontation took place.AP
Shiffer fled the FBI office when agents confronted him and was later killed in a shootout with police along a highway.