Travis Reinking: What we know about the Waffle House shooting suspect

Guns seized, then returned to suspect

Reinking moved to Nashville in fall 2017 and worked in construction, Metropolitan Nashville Police said. He was fired from one job in early April and had just started with another construction company on April 16, but did not return for his second day of work.

At the time of the White House incident, Reinking lived in an apartment above his father’s business, a crane rental company in Tremont, Illinois, according to the sheriff’s office incident reports. After his arrest at the White House for trespassing and being in a restricted area, the FBI and the Secret Service coordinated with local law enforcement to investigate Reinking and remove firearms from his possession, Matthew Espenshade, Assistant Special Agent in Charge of FBI’s Nashville office said Sunday.

On August 24, the Tazewell County Sheriff’s Office seized four firearms and ammunition from Reinking’s apartment along with his state firearm owners identification, according to an incident report. The seizure came less than two weeks after a Tazewell County sergeant said that Reinking drove up to his squad car and asked about filing a report.

Reinking told the sergeant that people were “tapping into his computer and phone” and barking like dogs outside his home, according to an August 11 incident report. He said he felt like he was being watched and that people were baiting him into breaking the law, the report states. He told the officer that it all started after he started writing to Taylor Swift, according to the report.

Officers released the firearms and ammo to Reinking’s father, Jeffrey, the report states. Investigators now believe that he returned the guns to his son. Of those four weapons, one was the AR-15 style weapon recovered from the shooting scene at Waffle House; another firearm was taken from Reinking’s apartment, Metropolitan Nashville Police said.

The two other guns could still be in Reinking’s possession, police said. Authorities are warning the public to keep their doors locked and eyes open while he is on the loose.

A history of ‘mental problems’

Less than a month before his arrest at the White House, Reinking crossed paths with law enforcement closer to home.

On June 16, 2017, an employee of his father’s business, J&J Cranes, called the Tazewell County Sheriff’s Office to report that Reinking came down from his apartment wearing a pink dress and holding a rifle, an incident report states.

The employee told police Reinking yelled “Is this what you f—–g want?” before he threw his rifle in his trunk and left, according to the report.

Around the same time, the Tremont Police Department responded to a call to a public pool, according to another incident report. The pool director told the responding officer that a man in his 20s barged into the pool wearing a pink women’s housecoat, the report states. The man dove into the pool and took off the coat and swam around in his underwear. When he got out of the pool, he shouted at lifeguards that he was a man and exposed his genitals to them, the report states.

The rifle stayed in the vehicle and no one at the pool asked to press charges, the officer said in the report. “This is an informational report showing the state of mind of Travis Reinking,” the report said.

Meanwhile, several members of the Tazewell County Sheriff’s Office went to J&J Cranes to speak with Reinking.

“Travis has some mental problems and I asked him if he would like to speak to (the Emergency Response Service) but he stated he didn’t want to,” the officer wrote in the report. “Travis had already spoken to them before and been in the hospital.”

The officer said he also called Reinking’s father, who was out of state. Jeffrey Reinking told the office he had taken three guns from his son before and locked them up “when Travis was having problems,” the report states.

Later in the day, the officer said in his report, “I called back Jeff Reinking and advised him of what happened and when he gets back home he might want to lock the guns back up until Travis gets mental help, which he stated he would.”

‘Delusional’ behavior involving Taylor Swift

It was not the first time Reinking’s mental health came to law enforcement’s attention.

On May 27, 2016, a Tazewell County Sheriff’s deputy met him and his parents in a drug store parking lot after his parents had called for help, according to an incident report.

A paramedic told the responding officer that Reinking was “delusional” and believed that Taylor Swift was harassing him by stalking and hacking his phone, the report states.

“Travis believed everyone including his own family and the police are involved,” the officer said in the report. “Travis stated he did not want to hurt Taylor Swift or anyone else, he only wanted the harassment to stop.”

Reinking told the officer the harassment began a few weeks earlier when Swift hacked his Netflix account and told him to meet her at a Dairy Queen, the report states. He told the officer that when he showed up she ran off and disappeared.

His parents told the officer he made comments about killing himself and that he had access to “many firearms” in his residence.

By then, another officer had arrived to help convince Reinking to go to a hospital for evaluation. He resisted their efforts, saying he was “free to leave” and that the officers were “violating his constitutional rights.” Finally, after four more officers arrived, Reinking agreed to go, saying it was “against his will.”

Authorities on alert

While multiple law enforcement agencies searched for Reinking on Sunday, deputies converged on his father’s business, J&J Cranes.

“At this point the young man could be anywhere and whether he might try to return home is a distinct possibility, so our officers are definitely on alert,” Tazewell County Sheriff Robert Huston said Sunday in a news conference.