Manuel Oliver, the father of a 17-year-old victim of the 2018 Parkland school shooting, was arrested on Thursday on Capitol Hill after allegedly disrupting a hearing on gun regulations. Representative Pat Fallon, a Republican from Texas, said that some people were being disruptive during the hearing, and the Capitol Police were asked to remove them. The police said that a man was arrested for crowding, obstructing, or incommoding, after he disrupted a hearing.
Here is @manueloliver00 being arrested for speaking out at a committee hearing. His son, Jaoquin, was shot to death in Parkland, Fl.
MANNY IS A HERO. He didn’t deserve this. The Republican Chair of this committee just called him a narcissist. Disgraceful. pic.twitter.com/6jccYvesHb
— Maxwell Alejandro Frost (@MaxwellFrostFL) March 23, 2023
In a video tweeted by Representative Maxwell Alejandro Frost, a Democratic from Florida, a woman yells, “Let my husband go!” A Democratic aide with knowledge of the situation said that Oliver and his wife, Patricia Oliver, attended the hearing.
“You’re removed. You’re breaching protocol and disorder in the committee room,” responded the officer. ““Back up or you’ll go to jail next,” they later warn her.
“Anyone who disrupts a Congressional hearing and disregards a law enforcement officer’s orders to stop are going to be arrested,” Capitol Police spokesperson Tim Barber said in a statement which was released after the incident.”
A police spokesperson said that the man was arrested because he refused to stop shouting after he was removed from the hearing room and then attempted to go back inside. The man was given a citation release arrest, which meant he was not put in jail. A woman who also disrupted the hearing was not arrested because she followed the lawful directions of the officers.
“It was really awful,” said Rep. David Cicilline. “They took them out of the room, and there was a sound like there was some big scuffle in the hallway.”
