Talk:1998 United States Capitol shooting

Article Note
This article is the creation following the AfD for the article for Special Agent John Gibson titled John Gibson (police officer). The concensus was heading in the direction of merging the articles for John Gibson, Jacob Chestnut into the Russell Eugene Weston article. I created this one which follows the titling precedent of the U.S. Capitol shooting incident (1954) article.

Please feel free to make additions to this article but please cite your sources. This article has the potential to be a Featured Article some day because of the amount of information out there relating its events.

If you have any questions, please feel free to drop me a line on my talk page. Cheers, Daysleeper47 14:38, 12 January 2007 (UTC)


 * I reckon we should probably rename it to 1998 U.S. Capitol shooting incident, and rename the other incident accordingly. Although not really a disaster, it's not far off either, certainly in terms of how to title it, so the naming convention developed by WP:DM] (which has, I beleive, since been adopted as official guidline) should be aplied. Comments? Blood Red Sandman Open Up Your Heart  -  Receive My EviLove  21:56, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I am not truly opposed to renaming both, but let's hold off until these peer reviews and good article nomination clear before we start a new talk on renaming them. Would that be acceptable? Both the WP:Law Enforcement and WP:Congress participants will probably have some comments on renaming. Thanks! --Daysleeper47 15:28, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Sorry for the delay replying; I forgot to watch the page and thought no response had come! It seems absolutly fine - in fact quite sensible - to wait until after the GA nom is through (Peer Review has finished by this time). By the way, for what it's worth, I don't see any problem with a see also section, despite the comment in the Peer Review. Blood Red Sandman Open Up Your Heart  -  Receive My EviLove  20:57, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

A major cause of this crime is Montana State Mental Hospital's decision to release Mr. Weston and use Greyhound Therapy on him in which hospital personnel put him on a long distance bus and the problem disappears." See The Washington Post July 28, 1998, p. A6 article on the Weston Case.  See also CNN Dec. 4, 1998 http://www.cnn.com/US/9812/04/weston.therapy/index.html referring to Greyhound Therapy.

Greyhound Therapy--putting mentally ill people on a long distance bus--to transfer them either to their family or to another State's mental hospital--seems to be a major form of therapy in America which failed in the Weston case. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 22 March 2007 (talk • contribs) 02:39

I am an amateur Wikipedia editor. However, on this 21st anniversary, I made some important corrections to this entry. I have first-hand knowledge of this tragic event. I was working that day, as the Acting Lieutenant assigned inside the Capitol building, and Officer Chestnut was my officer and friend. I was also friends with Detective Gibson. I was the first person to respond to Officer Chestnut's location. He was obviously in bad shape. I arrived so quickly, that Ofc McMillan was still standing behind a marble column, that he was using for cover,with his gun still out, and pointing toward where Weston had fled. If you are interested in contacting me, please do so at dmddusseau@gmail.com. Loyal Caps (talk) 11:26, 24 July 2019 (UTC)

GA Passed
Congrats, this is now considered a Good Article! It could use some minor work, such as adding Wiki links to words in sentences. For example, 2007 in the lead, Rep. Tom Delay has is articled on Wikipedia, X-Ray machine, etc. These were not fatal flaws however. Keep up the good work. If these are improved, you may wish to consider it for review as a featured article. Nja247 (talk • contribs) 10:18, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Two issues
a) Is Weston "the shooter" or "the suspect"? The article as a whole states as fact that he was the shooter, but calls him "the suspect" twice. Probably need to standardise that.

b) Is there any actual biography on Chestnut? There's an uncited comment about a military past, but no actual biographical details as with Gibson. Shimgray | talk | 23:45, 29 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Answer to your questions, I decided on using "suspect" because although there is no doubt that Weston is the shooter, he has not been charged or convicted of any crime (unfortunetly). Also, my research has turned up little on Chestnut beyond the standard "married with ** children". Gibson was well covered following the shooting so more is available. Another editor added the comment in Chestnut's original article, so I left it and added the "citation needed" template. Many thanks for the comments are the article. --Daysleeper47 12:34, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

Covert Crowd Control Weapon
Weston claimed the reason he went to Washington was to try to see his congressmen to see if he could stop the "radio waves" from attacking him. This is an unusual claim. Mentally ill or not, the crowd control weapons were currently and still are in field testing in the USA. Motive to use thes microwave and ultrasound devices against Weston would be to increase support for expanded mental health programs. Anyone repeatedly attacked with these devices would suffer the mental effects of sleep depravation. Unfortuately, the reason he was not allowed to be put before a judge was his claim of being attacked by radio waves. This allows the possibility that continued attacks would occur in the mental hospital, literally causing a decrease in mental capacity. 71.114.163.55 07:08, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Since this incident there have been claims by Aaron Alexis who did the Navy Shipyard Shootings of September 2013, and Hong Minh Trong who sent many letters with white powder and was finally arrested by the FBI in July 2014, each person claimed to be victim of directed energy attacks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.104.217.8 (talk) 17:03, 30 July 2014 (UTC)

GA Sweeps (kept)
This article has been reviewed as part of WikiProject Good articles/Project quality task force. I believe the article currently meets the criteria and should remain listed as a Good article. The article history has been updated to reflect this review. Regards, Ruslik 07:59, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Article name
Should this be moved to United States Capitol shooting incident (1998)? --Daysleeper47 (talk) 13:19, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

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RfC: Restoring Jacob Chestnut and John Gibson (police officer) articles
Given the recent strong support in restoring the Howard Charles Liebengood article despite it being deleted after an earlier AfD discussion, should the recently-merged Jacob Chestnut and John Gibson (police officer) articles be restored as well? Love of Corey (talk) 04:45, 18 August 2021 (UTC)


 * Comment - Pinging editors from Articles for deletion/Death of Howard Liebengood to stimulate discussion:       See Articles for deletion/Jacob Chestnut for reference. Love of Corey (talk) 04:45, 18 August 2021 (UTC)
 * It seems to me there's an important difference here: Liebengood's death was one of many facets of the Capitol assault, and notably (like Jeffrey L. Smith's death) did not take place during it. Chestnut and Gibson's deaths, meanwhile, are the most significant aspect of the '98 shooting. Given that Liebengood and Smith are not the subjects of biographies, but rather two event articles about their death (currently at AfD but leaning keep), those articles can be seen as WP:SPINOFFs of the full 2021 United States Capitol attack article. So an analogous standalone and  would only make sense if there were more content about their deaths than can reasonably be put in this article. Neither Liebengood, Smith, Chestnut, nor Gibson (nor, IMO, Billy Evans) is notable enough for a biography (as distinct from a "death of" article).  -- Tamzin  [cetacean needed] (she/they) 05:20, 18 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose for now. I don't see that they are notable enough outside of that one event for their own articles. I am open to evidence to the contrary, but being the victim of a tragedy does not establish enough notability for an article. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 10:59, 18 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Support 'Being very intensely publicized key victims of a tragedy that attracted extraordinary national interest with potential international implications does justify it.. Probably the article should be named Death of ...., but the first step is to restore it. Iam not quite sure why this is an  RfC. Ordinarily the next step after deletion is Deletion Review where those editors most interested in such questions in general will see it without being pinged.  DGG ( talk ) 23:01, 18 August 2021 (UTC)
 * (invited by the bot) I just took a quick look but suggest not turning them back into separate articles. Both for wp:notability considerations and also that a few paragraphs or 1 section is probably the best way to cover them. North8000 (talk) 21:44, 19 August 2021 (UTC)
 * So that's a Mild oppose North8000 (talk) 13:36, 22 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose - Their notability is only in the context of the shooting and it seems to me that the reader is better served reading about them within that context. It can be argued that Chestnut being "the first African American to lie in honor at the Capitol" offers him additional notability, but I sill don't think it's enough to warrant a separate article. PraiseVivec (talk) 12:48, 20 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Support The incident that led to their death is very much notable and warranted for inclusion. I am new to wikipedia, but feel strongly that we should be increasing knowledge of what these officers face (or faced) in protecting democracy itselfEsvabird (talk) 18:00, 20 August 2021 (UTC).
 * Oppose - I like the way the article is now, with all the information in one page. I don't see a need (maybe for now) to create additional articles. Sea Ane (talk) 10:12, 13 September 2021 (UTC)

Inaccuracies
I was an officer on Doug McMillan’s shift (First Responder Unit III) the day of the shooting. Doug was not injured that day. Also, it was Doug, not John, that hit Weston 4 times. John did return fire after being shot by Weston, hitting him a fifth time, apparently. 2600:1700:2380:3AD0:541:5E88:E1C9:E533 (talk) 07:57, 24 July 2023 (UTC)