By Allen Edmonds
Disinformation regarding Monday’s town hall appearance by U.S. Rep. Mark Alford (R-Mo.) continued to spread on Thursday, according to Belton Police Chief Scott Lyons, who had to deny a rumor that Alford was delivered to and from his event in an armored SWAT vehicle.
Though his department began planning its strategy for protecting the congressman and attendees as early as last Thursday, he said a SWAT team was never a component.
Alford appeared Monday night on “The Source with Kaitlan Collins” claiming there were people that “wanted to do me harm,” and that he had to be escorted out of Random’s Coffee House by a SWAT team.
By Thursday, Lyons had fielded the question from a citizen who told him she understood that the department’s armored vehicle was used to transport the congressman. “We don’t have the insurance for that, and we would never put him in that vehicle,” Lyons said. He said the vehicle was parked in the alley as a protective barrier for the congressman’s vehicle.
He also confirmed that a “SWAT team” was never formed for any part of the event, though many of the officers scattered throughout the scene providing security do serve on SWAT teams from time to time when the occasion warrants. This was not one of those times, he said.
“We just wanted to make sure we had enough officers on hand to protect not only the speaker, but members of the public that wanted to exercise their First Amendment freedoms. The only concerns we had were when the crowds grew and began to expand out between the parked cars on Main Street.”
He said the department had arranged for barricades in case the 400 block of Main Street needed to be blocked off, but that ended up not being required. He was hoping that wouldn’t happen because of the effect it could have had on neighboring businesses.
He said there were no arrests despite the highly charged emotional environment.
“Maybe a couple of stern conversations, but no arrests.”
He said officers were trained not to attempt to intimidate, just to be present, “and to allow the public to exercise their rights.”
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