Elvis Piggott at a Tiger Bay candidate forum at Cuban Club in Ybor City, Florida on Aug. 15, 2025. Credit: Dave Decker / Creative Loafing Tampa Bay
By many accounts, last Thursday’s District 5 Tampa City Council forum was one the best of the campaign so far. But it’s what happened afterwards that ended up in headlines over the weekend.
A rep for Tampa Police Department told Creative Loafing Tampa Bay that just before 8 p.m. on Oct. 9, officers responded to the Tampa Heights Junior Civic Association after a reported altercation where one subject was armed with a gun. “Officers quickly arrived and detained the armed male subject as they began their investigation. The subject was later released. There were no injuries,” the TPD spokesperson said, adding that the investigation remains open and active.
Elvis Piggott told CL that the man holding a gun was him. “I am always with a concealed firearm,” he added.
Piggott said that he submitted a statement to TPD and the State Attorney and that he has faith in the authorities to “investigate fairly.”
Piggott—a pastor at Triumph Church of Tampa who’s run in various elections dating back to 2018—earned just under 5% of the vote last month in a special election for Tampa City Council’s District 5. The seat has been vacant since June after the unexpected passing of Councilwoman Gwen Henderson.
Piggott failed to make this month’s runoff, but was among those in the crowd to hear from the remaining candidates: Naya Young and Thomas Scott.
The race is nonpartisan, but both Young and Scott are Democrats. Pigott, a former Democrat-turned Republican, has come out in favor of Scott and been critical of Young since the first round of voting.
Last Friday, Scott told CL that he was no longer at the forum when Pigott flashed his weapon. “It was an unfortunate incident, and right now, I’m just focusing on my campaign,” he added.
Young issued a statement last Friday thanking community members and local authorities for their swift response, emphasizing “the importance of maintaining civility and respect throughout the electoral process.”
“My heart goes out to those who experienced this shocking and unprovoked act of violence and intimidation in the course of their civic participation. The sanctity of our electoral process must always be held in the highest regard,” Young added.
Piggott took offense to Young’s statement calling his brandishing of a firearm “unprovoked,” and told CL that a member of Young’s family put his hands on him. Asked for a response, Young pointed to her previous statement, and added that, “The matter is with TPD. An active investigation is underway.”
Reports from other news outlets had linked the incident to Owen Young, but Pigott himself said it was not Owen Young that threatened him last Thursday night. “The altercation came from an unknown suspect that I had never saw in my life,” Pigott told CL.
Jason Marlow, a longtime Tampa politico, was at the forum and told CL that Owen Young was 15-to-20-feet away when the argument began.
Rick Fernandez, President of the Tampa Heights Civic Association, doesn’t know what match lit the provocation, but told CL that he was standing just five feet away near the band that played the forum. Volunteers were helping break down chairs when Fernandez, who’s come out in support of Naya Young, heard raised voices and turned around to see two men face-to-face and pushing each other.
Fernandez said at least 50 people were still in the room, including elderly folks and Piggot’s two-year-old son, Elvis Jr., who was in the care of developer and longtime political activist Kella McCaskill at the time.
“It looked like an elder version of a school yard scuffle,” Fernandez, who has endorsed Naya Young, told CL. Fernandez could not make out the words being exchanged, but moved towards the men with the intent of separating them.
“As I got to within about two or three feet of Mr. Piggott, I noticed that he had a gun in his right hand at his waist, pointed to the ground. I did not see him pull the gun. I did not see the gun raised any higher than what I just described. I don’t know if he ever did or did not. That’s what I saw,” Fernandez said.
Marlow told CL that he saw Piggott point the gun at chest-height in front of him, but disputed any notion that Piggott had any right to fear for his life. “I can say he had no such provocation,” Marlow added.
Florida is now an open-carry state, according to Attorney General James Uthmeier. With exceptions, the state’s “Stand Your Ground” law allows for the use of deadly force, without a duty to retreat, if a person “reasonably believes that such conduct is necessary to defend himself or herself or another against the other’s imminent use of unlawful force.”
Fernandez told CL that there was no off-duty police officer on site, but that the Tampa Heights Civic Association had hired four private, armed security officers starting at around 5:30 p.m. and stayed well past 8 p.m.
“They were not all in the room. They were scattered about either in the room, or outside, or guarding the parking area,” he said, adding that he regrets not having posted signage about no firearms being allowed in the building—which is the organization’s right as a private entity.
“Even if we had, would anybody have honored it if they wanted to bring a concealed weapon in? I would have had no way of knowing without some kind of a metal detection situation—and maybe that’s where we go next time,” Fernandez said.
Garret Greco, one of the onstage hosts for last Thursday’s forum, told CL he was disappointed that a successful forum devolved into political violence and that people in the audience may now associate a political event with guns being drawn.
“I don’t like the idea that there’s good people from neighborhoods that come that care about their community, that might be fearful of coming to the next debate,” Greco, who is also host of the Tampa Bay Developer podcast, added.
McCaskill, a frequent commenter at Tampa City Council, went on social media over the weekend to say that she would no longer attend forums and is less inclined to attend council meetings—even though no weapons are allowed in council chambers and attendees are subject to metal detectors—for fear of what might happen outside.
Via a spokesperson on the day after the incident, Tampa Mayor Jane Castor declined to comment, citing the open investigation.
Sandy Freedman—Tampa’s first female mayor who was elected to lead the city twice after serving on city council for nearly a decade—knows that the temperature can rise when politics is involved, but said last Thursday’s incident might be unprecedented at a public council forum.
“I’ve never even seen fisticuffs, if there is such a word used anymore,” she told CL, adding that any mayor should comment on things related to the concerns of their constituents—especially one that was a former police chief as Castor is.
“I would have had a response immediately that this was inappropriate for any gathering,” Freedman added.
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This article appears in Oct. 9-15, 2025.
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