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SALT LAKE CITY — A man who held a hostage at the FBI’s Salt Lake headquarters eight years ago allegedly crashed his car into the building’s security gate Sunday because he wanted to talk to an agent.
Robert Joseph Hibbard, 49, of Midvale, faces one count of destruction of government property, according to a complaint filed Monday in U.S. District Court.
Hibbard told investigators that he had asked a security guard at the visitor entrance to speak with an agent but was told one wasn’t available, the complaint says. The guard gave him a telephone number for the office and Hibbard left.
He drove to a nearby gas station and called the number but no one answered. He became upset and drove back to the building, driving around it several times before crashing his Toyota minivan through the northeast gate, according to the complaint.
Hibbard told investigators he was upset the guard wouldn’t let him into the building and wanted to commit a federal crime to attract the attention of an FBI agent, the complaint says.
In 2012, Hibbard held a man hostage at knifepoint at the FBI’s Salt Lake headquarters in an incident tied to the death of his ex-wife the year before. Hibbard believed his ex-wife’s new husband should have been charged with murder.
Related:
Man who held a hostage at FBI headquarters gets probation
A man who admitted to holding a hostage at knife point at the FBI's Salt Lake headquarters was sentenced Monday to three years of probation.When he went to the building where the FBI’s offices were, he was asked to leave by a man who said Hibbard seemed agitated. Hibbard grabbed the man from behind, placed an object to the man’s back and told him it was a gun, police said. The object was later found to be a knife.
Hibbard then placed the man in a headlock, told him he needed a forensic psychiatrist and ordered him to take him to the 12th floor, where the FBI offices were located. Once they arrived, he let the man go, handed him the knife and was taken into custody by an FBI agent.
Hibbard pleaded guilty but mentally ill to second-degree felony kidnapping in state court in 2014 and was sentenced to three years of probation.
