Kelcey Turner has remained detained throughout the entirety of the trial. Foley Police Department photo.
An armed Alabama man who impersonated an FBI agent during a bizarre 2021 crime spree is going to prison.
On Thursday, Aug. 4, in Mobile, US District Court Judge Terry F. Moorer sentenced Kelcey Jerel Turner to three years behind bars and another three years of supervised release when he exits a federal penitentiary.
In a plea deal with federal prosecutors inked on April 1, Turner, 36, confessed to being a drug abuser who unlawfully possessed a firearm. In exchange, authorities tossed the charge for posing as a federal law enforcement officer.
Turner’s case has been dogged by questions about his sanity. Although he was determined fit to stand trial, Turner’s prison sentence requires him to undergo mental health screening and treatment, including for drug addiction.
Turner’s attorney in Mobile, Michael D. Hickman, didn’t respond to Coffee or Die Magazine’s messages seeking comment. But in a sentencing memorandum, he blamed his client’s unusual behavior on a bad mixture of Suboxone and marijuana oil that triggered a “serious break from reality” so severe that Turner heard voices in his head.
During a bizarre March 11, 2021, crime spree in Foley, Alabama, Kelcey Jerel Turner claimed to hear voices while posing as an FBI agent who drove a Dodge Charger and carried a Glock 9mm pistol. Coffee or Die Magazine composite.
The break came on March 11, 2021, in Foley, Alabama. Wearing a shoulder holster containing a semi-automatic Glock 9mm pistol, Turner approached a Foley Police officer directing traffic near the small town’s middle school.
The cop asked Turner whether there was a problem, and Turner retorted, “I don’t know. Is there?” Turner then left in an indigo-colored Dodge Challenger while the officer called in the odd interaction.
The next dispatch to police would arrive moments later from SERVPRO of Baldwin County, a water-damage restoration company five blocks east of the school. Turner had driven there and confronted an employee — identified only as “W.A.” in the court records — sitting outside the firm in his vehicle.
Pointing his loaded pistol at the man, Turner identified himself as an FBI special agent, grabbed W.A.’s wallet, and spoke the man’s name into a fake microphone, acting as if he had an earpiece inserted while he was talking to his agency.
That drew a crowd of SERVPRO employees who asked Turner to show his badge, which he claimed FBI agents don’t carry. Twisting W.A.’s arm, Turner walked him a few feet to another car and then released him, fleeing the scene in his own Challenger.
A semi-automatic Norinco rifle, SKS 7.62x39 with serial number 8151167P was found during a state search warrant executed on Kelcey Turner's home and vehicle. Foley Police Department photo.
Foley Police caught up with Turner in his Dodge near his Ogden Court home. They pulled him over and arrested him without incident.
He was still wearing the shoulder holster with the pistol, but inside the Challenger, officers also turned up a semi-automatic Norinco SKS 7.62mm rifle and a 50-round drum magazine for the Glock.
Inside his house, they located a 75-round drum magazine for the rifle and 23 rounds of ammo for the Glock, plus a marijuana grinder and some pot.
They arrested him for impersonating a police officer and menacing. If he’s convicted of those crimes, he’ll serve his sentence concurrently with the federal punishment.
Officers reviewing surveillance footage later that day realized that, shortly before he was arrested, Turner also tried to enter the Foley Justice Center while armed. He was unable to gain access, so he left.
Alabama's Foley Police Department boasts 66 sworn officers and 31 other employees. Foley Police Department photo.
Authorities said they didn’t know his motive for trying to get into the building.
Before his arrest by the Foley Police, Turner had only one conviction on his rap sheet: a misdemeanor marijuana-possession charge.
He’d received his General Education Development diploma in 2004, received culinary training through the Job Corps, and had been working as a cook for a decade before his very strange day in Foley.
He hadn’t even missed a mortgage payment on his house.
Turner faced a maximum sentence of 10 years behind bars. The judge gave him three.
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Joshua Skovlund is a former staff writer for Coffee or Die. He covered the 75th anniversary of D-Day in France, multinational military exercises in Germany, and civil unrest during the 2020 riots in Minneapolis. Born and raised in small-town South Dakota, he grew up playing football and soccer before serving as a forward observer in the US Army. After leaving the service, he worked as a personal trainer while earning his paramedic license. After five years as in paramedicine, he transitioned to a career in multimedia journalism. Joshua is married with two children.
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