A Gainesville man faced a more than $1.7 million bond after an incident that police said began with him honking at officers.
Rance James Shannon, a 27-year-old convicted felon, stopped behind four police cars and emergency vehicles from Gainesville Fire Rescue and Alachua County Fire Rescue that were responding to a car crash in Midtown and held down his horn at about 2:30 a.m. Wednesday, GPD spokesperson Officer Ben Tobias wrote in an email.
Police approached Shannon and reported he smelled of marijuana and showed signs of impairment, according to an arrest report.
Police found a knife in his waistband, $10,400 in cash in his pants and a loaded 9mm Sig Sauer pistol and AR-15 assault rifle within reach, according to the report. Next to the guns, police found a messenger bag with two mason jars filled with nearly 264 grams of marijuana, as well as about 94 grams of cocaine, hash resin, nearly 12 grams of amphetamine powder, about 16 Xanax pills and one Oxycodone pill, Tobias said.
The bag also held 100 small Ziploc bags and $602, according to the report.
In the car’s trunk, police found an AK-47 assault rifle, four handguns, a baseball bat, bolt cutters and gloves, Tobias said. There was also a stun gun and several loose bullets of different calibers, according to the report.
After his arrest, Shannon told police he was trying to get them to kill him because he’d prefer that to being arrested, according to the report. He said he had the guns for protection and to patrol the streets, according to the report.
Shannon told officers he was a nice guy because he had guns in reach and didn’t use them on police, according to the report.
He was arrested on charges of possession of a concealed firearm, possession of a concealed firearm by a convicted felon, three counts of possession of a controlled substance, trafficking in cocaine, possession of drug paraphernalia, maintaining a drug dwelling and possession of marijuana with intent to sell within 1,000 feet of a college.
He was taken to the Alachua County Jail where he remains in lieu of a $1,745,000 bond.
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Rance James Shannon, 27, was arrested on charges of possession of a concealed firearm, possession of a concealed firearm by a convicted felon, three counts of possession of a controlled substance, trafficking in cocaine, possession of drug paraphernalia, maintaining a drug dwelling and possession of marijuana with intent to sell within 1,000 feet of a college. He faces a more than $1.7 million bond.
