Cops Charge Zip-Tie Guys Who Ambushed School Principal Over COVID Rules

All three members of an Arizona trio who barged into an elementary school principal’s office with zip ties and threatened to place her under citizens’ arrest for following public health guidelines have instead been arrested themselves, the Tucson Police Department confirmed.

“58-year-old Frank Tainatongo was cited and released for misdemeanor trespassing yesterday,” Tucson PD spokesman Sgt. Richard Gradillas told The Daily Beast. “He would be the third person cited and released related to this incident.”

Last week, Tainatongo accompanied marketing strategist and coffee shop owner Kelly Walker, 51, and Rishi Rambaran, 40, as Rambaran accosted Principal Diane Vargo while she sat with another educator at Tucson’s Mesquite Elementary School. Rambaran's son had been told by the school to mask up and quarantine after reportedly being exposed to someone with COVID-19. Walker livestreamed the confrontation on his shop’s Instagram. In the footage, Tainatongo, who remained unidentified until today, could be seen standing in the doorway holding multiple pairs of “law enforcement-grade” zip ties. The video has since been deleted.

“When this kind of coercion and bullying is perpetrated by school administrators, breaking the law, a citizen’s arrest is an option worth looking into,” Walker wrote on Facebook last Thursday.

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On Monday, Tainatongo was booked on a charge of third-degree criminal trespass, the same charge leveled at Walker and Rambaran. If convicted, all three face up to 30 days in jail. Gradillas said citizens’ arrests are extremely rare, and that he has never seen one carried out in his 14 years on the job.

Tainatongo’s LinkedIn profile says he works as a production manager for the Rincon Research Corporation, a government contractor that develops software for the U.S. military, NASA, and the intelligence community.