LEWISTON, ME- The best friend of a man who carried out a deadly mass shooting across two locations in Maine back in October is speaking out three months after the deadly rampage, saying he warned Army reserve supervisors and law enforcement authorities that Robert Card was ready to snap.
This is the latest in a history of mass shooters signaling their intentions and nobody doing anything about it.
The Associated Press reported that Sean Hodgson, Card’s longtime friend for nearly 20 years, grew increasingly concerned about Card’s anger and paranoia. Knowing he had access to guns, Hodgson did the only thing he could think of, which was to send a text to their Army reserve supervisor.
“I believe he’s going to snap and do a mass shooting,” Hodgson wrote on September 15, 2023. Only six weeks later, Card engaged in an unhinged rampage at a bowling alley and bar in this small Maine city, shooting 18 people, mortally wounding 15 of them, including a 14-year-old at the bowling alley.
The onslaught led to a regional lockdown in the Lewiston area and ended two days later when he was found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound inside a trailer.
“I wasn’t in his head. I don’t know exactly what went on,” Hodgson told the AP in an exclusive interview. “But I do know I was right.”
Hodgson wasn’t the only person close to Card who grew increasingly concerned. For example, last May, relatives warned police that Card was paranoid and also expressed alarm at his access to guns. An Army reservist, Card was hospitalized in a psychiatric unit for two weeks after he shoved a fellow soldier and locked himself in a motel room.
More worrisome, in August, he was barred from handling weapons while on duty and was declared “undeployable.”
In September, Hodgson advised Army Reserve authorities to change the passcode to the gate at the Reserve training facility and warned them to arm themselves if Card showed up.
‘Please. I believe he’s messed up in the head,” Hodgson wrote.
As we have seen in many mass shooting cases, authorities didn’t do anything to confront the clearly-disturbed Card. That led to the deadliest shooting in Maine history, an event that once again saw anti-gun advocates quickly go on the offensive in a case that clearly could have been mitigated if not prevented.
For Hodgson, the lack of interest by law enforcement and Army officials makes him angry, especially in light of an independent review conducted for the Sagadahoc County Sheriff’s Department, which blew off concerns about Card.
That review was conducted by a lawyer who’s a retired DEA agent, however, it left many unanswered questions, some legal experts told the AP.
According to Sheriff Joel Merry of the sheriff’s department, the review said the department’s response to complaints about Card was “reasonable under the totality of the circumstances” at that time. Merry said deputies “followed the law and their training with the information available at the time.”
Despite that, Maine Gov. Janet Mills (D) has appointed an independent commission chaired by a former state chief justice to review the entirety of the case. Moreover, Maine’s congressional delegation said last month that they are asking an independent Army inspector general to review the Army’s actions. This probe will take place alongside an ongoing Army investigation.
The review showed that local law enforcement was aware of Card’s mental health issues, with reports he was paranoid, hearing voices, experiencing psychotic episodes, and possibly dealing with schizophrenia.
In May, Card’s son and ex-wife reached out to a local SRO to advise him about Card’s erratic behavior. A deputy assisted them with getting help, and they cooperated in not confronting Card directly out of fear it would escalate the situation.
After Hodgson warned Army officials about Card’s erratic behavior, they briefly staked out the reserve center and visited Card’s home in Bowdoin, Maine. Sagadahoc Sheriff’s Sgt. Aaron Skolfield responded to Card’s home on Sept. 15 to assess him face-to-face–a necessary step to see if he could be taken into protective custody and therefore trigger Maine’s “yellow flag” law, which would have permitted deputies to remove his guns.
Skolfield called for backup due to Card’s perceived psychological state. Although the curtains inside moved and deputies heard shuffling around in the house, which suggested he was home, Card didn’t answer the door, and there was no legal basis for deputies to force entry into the home since there wasn’t an active threat of harm.
Skolfield left Card’s home, visited Card’s father, who lived nearby, and then returned to stake out Card’s home. The report said he was then called away on a domestic disturbance call.
Skolfield was in constant contact with other police officials, Army officials, and Card’s family to ensure family members were trying to restrict Card’s access to firearms.
After September 17, no contact was initiated with the sheriff’s office from either Card’s family or reserve staff, and on September 18, a sheriff’s advisory bulletin to locate Card was lifted.
The report didn’t sit well with Adante Pointer, a civil rights attorney based in Oakland, California, who reviewed its findings. He claims law enforcement had several opportunities to intercede in “this growing, escalating, and ultimately deadly situation,” he said but did not. He said the report indicated deputies were “scared” to deal with Card.
One area of the report that angered Hodgson is where he was described as being “over the top” and “alarmist.”
“I did my job, and I went over and beyond it, and I literally spelled it out for them,” said Hodgson. “I don’t know how clear I could have gotten.”
All told Hodgson’s version of events, police reports, videos, and other interviews paints a clear picture that the carnage on October 25 may have been preventable.
The AP reached out to the Army Reserve, who said in a statement that an investigation and independent probe by the Army inspector general are underway and judgment should be withheld until their reports are finalized.
“Any speculation at this point without having all the details could affect the outcome of the investigation. More details may become available once the investigation is complete,” Lt. Col. Addie Leonhardt, an Army Reserve spokesman, told the AP.
Meanwhile, Sheriff Merry didn’t specifically respond to questions about whether Hodgson’s warnings about Card were taken seriously, however, he acknowledged a need for public policy changes. He said his office has been “fully transparent” and has cooperated with the commission appointed by Mills.
Hodgson believes that while failings occurred, he can’t precisely define them other than he believes more could have been done to prevent Card’s rampage.
“I understand he did a horrific thing. I don’t agree with it. But I loved him,” Hodgson said. “I didn’t want any of this for anybody.”
Card and Hodgson had been friends since 2006, when they met in the Army reserve. After he was evicted from his Hew Hampshire apartment in 2022, Card invited Hodgson to move to Maine, and the two friends lived together for about a month. After his stay in the psychiatric hospital in New York last July, it was Hodgson who drove Card back to Maine.
It was around that time that Card started railing about people allegedly accusing him of being a pedophile. That came about as a case of mistaken identity since there was another Robert Card found on Maine’s sex offender registry. Card told Hodgson about an incident at a bowling alley when a father pulled his daughter away from Card after he merely said hello to the toddler.
“I always believed him. I always stuck by him,” Hodgson said. “I am the closest one to Robert Card. Besides his mother, he pushed everybody away. “I was the last one he pushed away.”
Hodgson then related a night last September when the two went to a local casino. On the way home, he said Card began “flipping out,” pounding the steering wheel and almost crashing several times. Hodgson begged him to pull over, and Card punched him in the face when he did.
“We were having a good night, and he just snapped,” Hodgson recalled.
Card dropped him off at a gas station near his house, and as he exited the car, he told Card,” I love and I’ll always be here for you no matter what.”
That incident sparked Hodgson to text his training supervisor at the Army Reserve over fear of what Card might do. He said he didn’t speak to his friend after that, even though they passed by each other at work.
“It took me a lot to report somebody I love,” Hodgson said. “But when the hair starts standing up on the back of your neck, you have to listen.”
After receiving his text, Army officials asked if Card had made any specific threats toward anyone, which he had not. However, he said, they didn’t ask for any help approaching Card, even though both drove trucks for the same company.
“I could’ve told them when he was at work, when he was home, what hours he worked,” he said.
The AP reviewed videos released by the sheriff’s department, and in one, they downplayed Hodgson’s warning, alleging he may have been drunk. Army Reserve Capt. Jeremy Reamer accused Hodgson of not being “the most credible of our soldiers” while telling Skolfield Hodgson’s message should be taken “with a grain of salt.”
Hodgson, unaware of those comments until told by the AP, admitted to struggling with PTSD and alcoholism. However, he insists he wasn’t drinking that night and was awake awaiting a call from his boss since he works nights.
Hodgson does have some skeletons in his closet, one related to a domestic assault he allegedly committed in 2022 and another of violating his conditions of bail by possessing alcohol in December. He’s also facing some internal discipline from the Army after he wrecked a military vehicle last summer. All of that aside, he believes officials should have taken him more seriously, especially given his past training in threat detection and mitigation and his previous work as a security officer at a nuclear plant.
“That was the most difficult thing I ever had to do, was report him to command, and I did that. And for them to discredit me?” he said. “It pisses me off because all they had to do is listen.”
When contacted by the AP, Reamer refused to comment and referred the outlet to Army Reserve public affairs officials.
Card said when he heard about the Lewiston shooting, he knew it was Card, and he called his sergeant.
“I don’t believe in coincidences,” he told the sergeant. “I know it's Robert Card.”
Card said he told authorities right away that Card was probably headed to the Maine Recycling Corp., where his body was ultimately found.
Over two months later, Hodgson is angry that Card “took the easy way out” and, therefore, isn’t able to answer questions or face the consequences of what he did that October evening. He said that man wasn’t the man he had befriended over 17 years ago.
More than anything, Hodgson wants people to know that he did everything in his power to prevent the carnage that took place at the bar and bowling alley that night.
“I don’t know how to express to people how much I loved him, how much I cared about him,” Hodgson said. “And how much I hate what he did.”
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