Overview
- A federal grand jury returned an indictment on June 18, 2026, charging 27-year-old Forrest Kendall Pemberton of Gainesville with an attempted hate crime and related firearm offenses.
- Court filings allege Pemberton armed himself with an AR-15–style rifle fitted with a silencer and traveled to an office of a nonprofit that lobbies in support of Israel on Dec. 23, 2024, and news outlets have identified the building as an AIPAC office though the DOJ documents did not name it.
- He faces counts for attempted hate crime, using and carrying a firearm during a crime of violence, and possession of a short-barreled rifle, with penalties that include life in prison on the hate-crime count and a consecutive mandatory term on the firearm count.
- Investigators say they traced Pemberton using cellphone geolocation, that he allegedly planned to volunteer to gain access, and that authorities interacted with him after a Dec. 25, 2024 traffic stop before interviewing him on Dec. 26 and arresting him on Dec. 27.
- The case is being prosecuted by the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida, and officials say the probe involved the FBI, ATF and local police, a coordination that could influence how federal agencies pursue bias-motivated violence going forward.