Heather Curtis
WMAL.com
WASHINGTON – Virginia State Senator Bill Stanley said the father of TV reporter Alison Parker, who was killed live on the air in August, threatened him and his family in messages on Facebook and to his campaign.
“I’m going to be your worst nightmare, you little bastard,” Andy Parker wrote to Stanley in a private Facebook message.
Stanley said two hours before that message was sent, Parker sent a message to his campaign that said, ” You didn’t even has the decency to reach out and offer a lame condolence after my daughter Alison Bailey was murdered in your district. When you see me again, you best walk the other way lest I beat your little ass with my bare hands.”
Stanley viewed the messages as a physical threat to him and his family and told WMAL they have been on guard since the messages. His teenage son texted his mother every half hour from school to make sure she was safe. He said Parker has blamed him and other politicians supported by the NRA for the murder of his daughter and her colleague Adam Ward.
Speaking on Newsradio 1140 WRVA in Richmond Governor Terry McAuliffe said, “Bill Stanley knew that Andy Parker had no interest in physically harming him. This is a political stunt by Bill Stanley. I know Bill. I just talked to him the other day on budget issues. Come on, Bill, you’re tougher than that. Man up.”
Stanley said the real political stunt is the governor and others using Parker, a gun control advocate since his daughter’s murder, to push their gun control agenda. He added he immediately called police, not the media, after reading the messages.
He said he takes offense to the governor’s comment to man up. “I guess I should tell my 13-year-old that the governor is telling him, because he has this very real fear for the safety of his mother, that the governor is telling him that he should just man up,” Stanley said adding that if the governor received these kinds of threats he would surround himself with the Executive Protection Unit, but McAuliffe told WRVA if he reported every online threat made against him, he wouldn’t have time to do anything else.
WMAL couldn’t reach Parker for comment before deadline.
