A former KSTP-TV worker told the station’s security director he wanted his job back and said, “You know what happened yesterday in Maryland,” the day after a gunman killed five people at a newspaper in that state, according to a criminal complaint filed Monday.

The Ramsey County attorney’s office charged Rusty Gene Arntson, 36, with threats of violence, a felony.

Arntson was fired from Hubbard Broadcasting, which owns KSTP-TV, last year “after he had a confrontation with a female coworker who he blamed for causing him to have a previous suspension,” the complaint said.

On June 21, Hubbard Broadcasting security learned Arntson, of Brooklyn Center, was on the station’s St. Paul campus and had talked to a male employee.

He “made several disturbing comments” to the employee, including saying that “police had extracted things from his body” during interactions he had with law enforcement, the complaint said. “Arntson said that women were like black widow spiders, but he reassured the male employee by saying, ‘I won’t kill you because you’re a man.'”

The company’s security director left messages for Arntson on June 25.

Arntson called back Friday, brought up his termination, “became very emotional” and said he wanted his job back, according to the complaint. He made reference to Maryland, where five people were killed by an allegedly disgruntled man at the Capital Gazette newspaper in Annapolis, and “said he expected to get a job offer to get his job back and ended the conversation,” the complaint continued.

Police arrested Arntson. He told an investigator “that he made the reference to the incident in Maryland as a warning to (Hubbard Broadcasting Co.) that if they continued to treat their employees badly one of them may come back to hurt them,” according to the complaint.

Arntson said he did not intend to hurt anyone “but was only trying to protect the company from their own malicious behavior,” the complaint said. He told the investigator “he is a Christian and has no plans to hurt anyone because if he were to do so he would burn in hell.”

The investigator noted that Arntson “made several bizarre statements” and Arntson told him “that he is a legally abandoned child under the law and that NATO has been paying his bills,” the complaint said. “Arntson made reference to the Department of Justice and the FBI being involved with (Hubbard Broadcasting) in regards to his dispute with the company over unemployment insurance.”

Arntson has a permit to carry a firearm in Hennepin County, the complaint said. Related Articles Man reports he had to stab his dog after attack in St. Paul; police investigating

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His attorney could not be reached for comment Monday.

Joe Johnston, director of public affairs for Hubbard Broadcasting, said he could not comment on what kind of work Arntson did for the station.

“Hubbard Broadcasting takes the safety and security of its employees seriously,” Johnston said in a statement. “… We are currently cooperating with law enforcement.”