NEW ORLEANS (AP) 鈥� Authorities say a former North Carolina law enforcement officer planned to kill Black people in a mass shooting at a major New Orleans festival but was arrested at a Florida hotel with a handgun and hundreds of rounds of ammunition.
Authorities in several states did not name the event, but the , commonly known as Jazz Fest, runs from Thursday through May 3. The gathering attracted about 460,000 people last year, organizers said.
Christopher Gillum of Chapel Hill, North Carolina, was wanted for 鈥渢erroristic threats,鈥� the Okaloosa County Sheriff’s Office in Florida posted online Thursday. Federal authorities told the sheriff’s office that Gillum, who is white, was in the Florida Panhandle 鈥渉eading to do a mass shooting at a large festival in Louisiana.鈥� The FBI in New Orleans said it’s working on the investigation with law enforcement across the three states.
The Okaloosa sheriff鈥檚 office said Gillum was arrested without incident Wednesday night at a hotel in the city of Destin, and posted a photo of him being led away in handcuffs. Deputies recovered a handgun and about 200 rounds of ammunition from the hotel room, the statement said.
Gillum was arrested as a fugitive from justice and will be extradited to Louisiana to face charges there, the sheriff鈥檚 office said. It was not immediately known if he had a lawyer. The Associated Press left a message at phone numbers listed for him.
Gillum鈥檚 family reported him missing on Tuesday and he has a history of self-harm, according to Lt. Clint Lyons of the Alamance County Sheriff鈥檚 Office in North Carolina. Gillum鈥檚 family told law enforcement he had a gun and had 鈥渆xpressed recent threats to harm 鈥楤lack people,鈥欌�� according to a bulletin from police in Burlington, North Carolina.
Lyons said Gillum left the state before his agency could prepare the paperwork to involuntarily commit him to psychiatric treatment. Lyons said there were no criminal grounds to detain Gillum despite his comments about Black people 鈥渂ecause there was no victim,鈥� however the agency decided it needed to spread the word about him to other departments.
Gillum was located and stopped by law enforcement in Oklaloosa County on Wednesday, according to Lyons and the Burlington police bulletin.
However, he 鈥渄id not present any grounds for involuntary commitment or criminal charges鈥� and was allowed to continue on his way, the bulletin stated. Gillum told officers he was 鈥渆nroute to New Orleans,鈥� the report added.
Okaloosa deputies were initially asked to make a 鈥渨elfare check鈥� on him Wednesday morning but they didn’t know he’d been making violent threats, sheriff spokesperson Michele Nicholson said. Later that day, after the sheriff’s office learned Gillum was being investigated, deputies surveilled him until an arrest warrant arrived from Louisiana, she added.
鈥淎t this time, there are no known direct threats to any festivals in Louisiana,鈥� State Police spokesperson Trooper Danny Berrincha said.
Gillum served as a sworn police officer in Chapel Hill from 2004 until his resignation in 2019, town spokesperson Alex Carrasquillo said.
He worked as a police officer in the coastal town of Carolina Beach from October 2019 until his resignation the following October, town administrative services officer Sheila Nicholson said. Gillum became a detention officer in October 2023 with the Orange County, North Carolina, sheriff鈥檚 office and left in July 2024, spokesperson Alicia L. Stemper said.
He returned the Chapel Hill police force as a non-sworn employee in 2024 before leaving again by the end of the year, Carrasquillo said. He was then rehired as an Orange County sheriff’s deputy in January 2025 but resigned that September, she said.
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Mustian reported from Natchitoches, Louisiana, and McCormack from Concord, New Hampshire. Associated Press writer Allen G. Breed in Wake Forest, North Carolina, contributed.
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