COLUMBIA, Pa. (WHTM) – ABC27 News is learning new details of the two young men arrested for the attempted homicides of four Lancaster County police officers.
Seventeen-year-old Marquell Rentas and his cousin, 18-year-old Trenton Nace, face multiple counts stemming from the Friday morning incident.
“We’re really lucky one or more police officers did not get executed and assassinated,” Lancaster County District Attorney Craig Stedman said.
The incident marked the second time in a week police officers in the county were fired upon. Last Wednesday, Lancaster city police were also targeted.
“We’re alarmed like everybody else,” Stedman said. “We’ve got some broad issues facing our system, our county, and our country going forward. You just see ever so increasingly police are under attack in so many different arenas.”
The district attorney office has acknowledged police were familiar with the two suspects in Columbia.
On Monday, ABC27 heard from Roberto Rentas, the father of Trenton Nace. He said he knows some of the officers his son allegedly tried to kill.
Rentas said his son was motivated by the Black Lives Matter movement. He said in a statement that Nace and Rentas “are in jail for doing what Black Lives Matter wanted them to do: shoot at cops.”
“The truth is that these are two punk kids following the orders of an irresponsible organization and now they’re (going to) pay for it,” he said.
“Individuals are responsible for their own actions,” Stedman said. “I say there are leaders and there are groups that have to take responsibility for their rhetoric. I’ve seen some rhetoric that is very anti-police that will embolden some impressionable teenagers.”
Stedman said something needs to be done before a local officer is killed.
“It’s got to be a change from culture,” he said. “It has to be a change from our leaders who people look up to.”
Kevin Ressler, a co-organizer of the Black Lives Matter 717 movement, said their organization does not encourage violence.
Rentas and Nace remain in the Lancaster County Prison on $2 million bail each.
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