UFC bantamweight champion Sean O’Malley said that his home in Arizona was “swatted,” a term used when armed police are falsely called to a person’s residence in response to a violent threat or highly volatile situation.
O’Malley, who is known to stream online while playing video games, was shirtless with a gaming controller in his hands when he noticed police sirens in his driveway.
“Went home, I’m like, ‘You know what? I’m gonna stream today,'” O’Malley said on his podcast the “TimboSugar Show.”
“Streaming, about an hour and a half in I see a f***ing cop fly down my road,” O’Malley recalled. The fighter said that he had a feeling of what was happening after having seen many other high-profile streaming personalities receive the same treatment from angry viewers.
“People find out where they’re at and they call the cops, say something happened that obviously didn’t happen and then they’re f***ing getting swatted.”
‘They said I killed my parents or something like that. They thought there was an active shooter inside.’
“So, I peek out my head out the window to see if maybe it’s something else. But then they’re on the intercom, and I see a bunch of cops, and they’re like, ‘Walk out with your hands up.’ So I f***ing walk out, hands up. I was like, ‘I’m just gonna listen. I could get shot.’ I’ve got shotguns pointed at me, AR15s from like four different cops.” he added.
The UFC champion revealed that after being detained by police, he was notified that a 911 call had claimed that he had murdered both of his parents.
“They said I killed my parents or something like that. They thought there was an active shooter inside,” O’Malley explained. He said he was asked repeatedly if anyone was inside the residence.
“They’re like ‘who’s inside?!’ I’m like no it was just game, ‘who’s inside?!’ No one!” he told police. “Someone called the cops, said there’s an active shooter, two dead people in the house or something.”
O’Malley then explained that the responding police destroyed his doorbell camera because they wouldn’t want any active shooters in the home to know where they were situated.
Despite being a well-known figure, O’Malley said he was detained for about 35-40 minutes in the back of a police car before other police officers arrived on-scene and recognized him.
Once police recognized “the UFC champ,” O’Malley said the situation “got a lot less intense.”
The fighter was told by police that law enforcement has not been able to locate or identify the prank caller.
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