A top Missouri political aide has reportedly died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound a month after his boss – the Missouri State Auditor and Republican Tom Schweich – took his life with a gun, police said Monday.
State auditor’s spokesman Robert “Spence” Jackson was found dead Sunday night inside his Jefferson City apartment after police responded to concerns of a relative that he wasn’t answering the phone.
Authorities said they are investigating the case as a suicide.
Jackson’s former boss, Auditor Tom Schweich, had been running for the Republican nomination for Governor of the state when he shot himself in the head on Feb. 26 inside his home in Clayton, Missouri.
Schweich was also about to go public with complaints that a GOP rival was spreading a “whisper campaign” that Schweich was Jewish.
According to the Washington Post, Schweich was an Episcopalian Christian.
He had told others that he believed rivals – led by Missouri Republican Party chairman John Hancock – were spreading an anti-Semitic “whisper campaign” against him.
Jackson was among the first of Schweich’s allies to demand Hancock’s resignation from the top party post. Hancock has denied making anti-Semitic remarks but admitted telling people he thought, mistakenly, that Schweich was Jewish.
Jackson remained with the Auditor’s Office after Schweich’s death.
“The initial investigation gives detectives reason to believe this is most likely a suicide,” Jefferson City police Capt. Doug Shoemaker told reporters on Monday.
“There were no signs of forced entry nor any signs of a struggle. There was one firearm found at the apartment. A revolver and one spent round were recovered.”
Police also found a note from Jackson, but Shoemaker declined to elaborate.
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(Updated post)
OK, Fine. 