Tennessee man who threatened Little Caesars employees with rifle over pizza pleads guilty: report

A Tennessee man who threatened employees with a rifle at a Little Caesars because his pepperoni pizza order was taking too long has pleaded guilty. 

Charles Doty Jr., 64, was arrested in November 2021 after allegedly pointing an AK-47 at the pizza shop employees in Knoxville when the pizza wasn’t “hot-n-ready.”

He reportedly pleaded guilty to four counts of aggravated assault on Aug. 23, according to local reports. Fox News Digital has reached out to the Knox County District Attorney’s Office and the pizza chain. 

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Authorities responded to the Little Caesars at Cedar Bluff around 9 p.m. on Nov. 5, 2021. Witnesses told police that Doty, a Knoxville resident, became angry after being told about the wait and demanded free breadsticks. 

“It wasn’t even a 10-minute wait when he came in with the gun,” said Noah Beeler, who was working at the pizza restaurant that day. “If he would have not come in with the gun and waited another two maybe three minutes, it would have already been boxed and in his hands.”

Doty left the store and came back with the rifle demanding the pizza. He allegedly prevented one employee from leaving the store. 

To calm him down, another customer gave Doty her pizza so he would leave. 

“I handed her her crazy sauce,” Kimberleigh Murrell, who started working at the pizza shop that day, told WATE. “I’m about to have her leave, walking out. He comes in, the gun is pointed like this, held down a little bit. Then I look at it. My eyes drop to the gun. And he literally pulls it up, points it at me, semi-points at her, and says, ‘Where is my pizza? I want my pizza now.'”