Man gets 21 months in federal prison for bringing loaded gun into Richmond hospital
OAKLAND — A Bay Area man was given 21 months in federal prison last week, in connection with an incident last year when he entered the Kaiser hospital in Richmond carrying a stolen gun and nearly 200 rounds of ammo, court records show.
Michael Armstrong, 51, was experiencing a delusion related to his mental illness in October 2019 when he ran into the hospital with the gun protruding from his pants, his attorney wrote in court records. He believed he was being chased, and had a similar experience three months later when he led police on a 60 mile-an-hour chase after an officer spotted him with a machete at his hip, drove to the Kaiser in Walnut Creek, and was ultimately arrested.
Four months after that, Armstrong ran into an Alameda County Sheriff’s station and demanded to be taken into a psychiatric center. It was only after this third incident that he was indicted on federal charges of being a felon in possession of a firearm, according to court records.
Armstrong’s attorney, John Paul Reichmuth, wrote in a sentencing memo that his client’s mental illness was the “driving factor” behind the charge.
“This case was resolved during an unprecedented time in legal history,” Reichmuth wrote. “Mr. Armstrong first appeared in May 2020, when the pandemic was at a disruptive height. Mr. Armstrong missed an appearance, for example, because he was in quarantine.”
The 21-month sentence was agreed upon by both prosecutors and the defense, though Armstrong could have been sentenced to up to 46 months in federal prison. His criminal history includes a conviction related to a 2002 shooting and a 2016 gun possession case, according to court records.
“To the members of the community in the hospital, to include patients, family members, doctors, nurses and other personnel, the volatile behavior of a man armed with a gun screaming and running through the facility must have been terrifying,” assistant U.S. Attorney Jonathan Lee wrote in court records.