Suspected White House Shooter Arrested
Pennsylvania State Police arrested Wednesday a suspect in a shooting incident at the White House on Friday night.
Agents took custody of Oscar Ramiro Ortega-Hernandez, 21, and are now questioning him after his arrest at the Hampton Inn in White Township, Indiana County. Secret Service agents looking for him got a tip that the suspect was at the hotel and they informed the local police to arrest him.
An investigation has yet to establish if the suspect was the one who fired at the White House or owns the semi-automatic rifle found inside an abandoned car near the presidential residence after 9 p.m. on Friday.
The Secret Service is investigating if two bullets found by its agents outside the lawn of the White House were fired from that rifle. A window in the residential level of the White House had a crack and investigation is also ongoing to determine if it was caused by the shooting.
The presidential couple was out of the country at the time of the shooting and no one was hurt.
An unarmed Ortega-Hernandez was questioned by Arlington County, Va., police on Friday after someone reported him as walking suspiciously in the vicinity of the White House. The police took photographs of him, including the tattoos in his body, but did not arrest him because he had not committed any crime, said Arlington County police spokesman Lt. Joe Kantor, according to the New York Times.
The photographs was later used to find him after the U.S. Park Police obtained an arrest warrant charging him with a felony count of carrying a deadly weapon.
The search for Ortega-Hernandez included the Occupy D.C. protest camp on McPherson Square and talks with his relatives, apparently identified based on evidence found on the abandoned car.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives traced the origin of the firearm but did not say who owns it.