Maud Essen, one of the workers, said her colleague took pictures of Hubbard’s granddaughter and her kids. Other Hubbard campaign workers were in the area. She said she overheard one of them say: “Some guy took a photograph, so he’s going to come.”

Then Rodney Hubbard Sr. arrived in a black Mercedes.

“Everyone was scared,” Essen said. “He walked around talking to the different groups of people. Everybody just stood around waiting for him to talk to them.”

Hubbard walked in and out of the polling site several times, she said. After about a half-hour, he climbed back into the Mercedes. Essen thought Hubbard was about to leave. Instead he drove onto the lawn a few feet away from the entrance.

“I believe it was within 25 feet of the front door,” Essen said. “He points the front of the car at the sidewalk so that he can sit in air-conditioned comfort and watch all the people going in and out of the Carr Square Community Center.”

In one picture provided to the Post-Dispatch, the black Mercedes is parked on the grass near the center’s entrance. The driver’s-side door is open. A man stands behind the glass doors just inside the center. He appears to be wearing a fedora, jeans and a black T-shirt.

On the back of the shirt, Essen remembered, were white capital letters spelling out a title: “THE GENERAL.”

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Stephen Deere Stephen Deere is a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Follow Stephen Deere Close Get email notifications on {{subject}} daily! Your notification has been saved. There was a problem saving your notification. {{description}} Email notifications are only sent once a day, and only if there are new matching items. Save Manage followed notifications Close Followed notifications Please log in to use this feature Log In Don't have an account? Sign Up Today