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Indiana Man arrested for threatening Elon Musk on X, cops feared another UnitedHealthcare case
David A. Cherry was arrested in Indiana for making life-threatening statements towards Elon Musk on social media.
An Indiana man has been taken into custody on a felony charge of intimidation after allegedly making online threats against Elon Musk. The arrest comes after authorities in Texas flagged the concerning posts on X, leading to an investigation by Indiana State Police (ISP).
Who is David A. Cherry? Man threatened Elon Musk on X
David A. Cherry, a 28-year-old resident of Palmyra, was arrested on Tuesday following an investigation into life-threatening statements he allegedly posted on X.
Law enforcement officials have not disclosed the specific content of the threats, but they were deemed serious enough to warrant immediate action. He has since been charged with one count of felony intimidation and is being held without bond at the Harrison County Jail.
Authorities in Texas first alerted Indiana State Police early Tuesday morning about a user believed to be in southern Indiana who had posted threats directed at Musk. ISP detective quickly launched an investigation and swiftly tracked Cherry to Clarksville, where he was taken into custody.
ISP finds arsenal in home of man who threatened Musk on X
ISP combed his home in Palmyra and found various weapons and protective gear, including an AR-15-style rifle, a handgun, ammunition, and a ballistic vest.
“Obviously it’s a situation where you have somebody makes public statements on a social media network for everybody to see – threats against another person – and that has to be taken very seriously,” ISP Sgt. Carey Huls stated in a post-arrest statement.
“You know, it was just December last year, (UnitedHealthcare) CEO Brian Thompson was shot and killed walking along the sidewalk in Manhattan. Had there been some type of a social media post prior to that that could have been looked into and prevented something like this?”
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“So we can’t take those chances in this day and age to put something that’s very inflammatory, specific towards a person, and just expect that to go without us looking into it,” he warned.
“It’s a serious offense. Again, life-threatening statements. Our detectives applied for a search warrant, did go to the individual’s house, where they found some other information that would relate to those statements to basically corroborate and say, yes, this is a possibility.”
