Patricia McCloskey, Mark McCloskey

Mark T. McCloskey, 63, does not regret what he and his wife Patricia Novak McCloskey, 61, recently did in front of their house along Portland Place, a private street in the Central West End of Saint Louis, Missouri, United States. He has been responding to media’s questions while she is mum about the controversy.

On June 28, 2020, Mark and Patricia held a semiautomatic AR-15 rifle and a handgun, respectively, and confronted around 300 Black Lives Matter protesters who were marching through the Central West End toward St. Louis mayor Lyda Krewson‘s house. The protesters were demanding the mayor’s resignation because she released the names and addresses of residents who had suggested defunding the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department.

“If the same thing happened today, I would do it again,” Mark told Fox 2. He clarified that he and his wife support the right to protect their home and family as well as the message behind the Black Lives Matters movement.

“Two things: one, that gate is next to a sign that says ‘No Trespassing, public property ends there,'” Mark told the publication. “By the time the event was over and I went and took pictures with my cell, (the gate) was destroyed.”

Mark even compared the incident to the Storming of the Bastille, which took place in Paris, France on July 14, 1789. He told KMOV thathe and Patricia called 911 and grabbed their guns when they heard the protesters approaching their private community.

“The gate came down and a large crowd of angry, aggressive people poured through,” Mark told the publication. “I was terrified that we’d be murdered within seconds, our house would be burned down (and) our pets would be killed.”

Representing Mark and Patricia, who are personal-injury lawyers, is their fellow lawyer Albert Watkins. Defending his clients, Watkins told St. Louis Post-Dispatch that couple “acted lawfully” out of “fear and apprehension, the genesis of which was not race-related.”

Now known as Ken and Karen, a modern version of Bonnie and Clyde or an entitled white couple, Mark and Patricia claim that they have been receiving death threats. On June 30, 2020, they tried to reopen their business, the McCloskey Law Center, and their lines were jammed with calls.