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[What Happened]: Red Jacket Firearms & Will Hayden

What happened to Red Jacket Firearms of Sons of Guns fame? Or more importantly...Will Hayden. We go through the details and the current state of everything.

Hey, remember Will Hayden of “Sons of Guns” fame?

Well, the owner of Red Jacket Firearms and star of the Discovery Channel reality TV show that was popular from 2011 to 2014 turned out to be a terrible, terrible person.

Red Jacket Firearms
Red Jacket Firearms, Baton Rouge, Louisiana

To make a long — and sordid — story short, Hayden rose to fame as a reality TV star on the aforementioned show, which detailed the workings of the firearms business he founded. However, everything came crashing down in the show’s fifth season, when Hayden was accused of raping a minor.

He was later convicted of multiple felonies and is now serving two life sentences to run concurrently, plus an additional 40 years, for his crimes. He’s not eligible for release or parole, and he’ll never see the outside of a prison.

So what happened?

A Bad Man

It turns out that Hayden — whose outsized personality entertained television audiences before his rapid fall from stardom — is guilty of raping multiple young girls, including his own daughter, according to several reports, testimony at trial, and his own daughter’s words.

Will Hayden
Will Hayden

His crimes came to light when his then-assistant at Red Jacket Firearms, Rebecca Ramsey, reported to police that she walked in on Hayden at his Baton Rouge, Louisiana home, assaulting a young girl. That girl was later revealed to be Hayden’s youngest daughter, according to multiple reports.

“Sons of Guns” was subsequently canceled, and the victim gave testimony that Hayden assaulted her and threatened her with death in an attempt to keep her from reporting his crimes. She was only 11 at the time Hayden first raped her, she stated.

Her harrowing account led another victim to come forward, who detailed two incidents in which Hayden raped her in the early 1990s. This woman was 12 at the time of the first rape, and Hayden raped her on another occasion when she was 13, she reported in testimony at Hayden’s subsequent trial on two counts of aggravated rape and one count of forcible rape.

Finally, Hayden’s older daughter Stephanie came forward with accusations on an episode of Dr. Phil in which she detailed her own sexual assault by her father when she was 12.

Initially, Stephanie Hayden had defended her father publicly, but quickly reversed course and gave details of her own molestation, in part to support her younger sister, she later stated.

These are just the incidents we’ve heard about in the press. We can’t possibly know if Hayden has committed any other monstrous crimes. Still, hopefully, his victims and their families can take some comfort knowing he is safely behind bars and will never again see the world from outside prison walls.

The Aftermath

Hayden left multiple victims in his smoking crater of destruction, but by most reports, his victims, family, and former business partners are moving on with their lives.

Notably, his shop, Red Jacket Firearms, is now closed. Hayden’s former business partner and the shop’s co-owner at the time, Joe Meaux, initially tried to severe Red Jacket’s business relationship with Hayden after allegations came to light and keep the venture going.

However, the brand was too damaged from the fallout surrounding Hayden’s crimes, Meaux reported, and he subsequently closed the business down for good and opened two new ventures, Meaux Guns and Aklys Defense, based in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Hayden’s daughter Stephanie has indicated in a more recent interview — conducted by Vanessa Torres published on AmmoLand.com — that she and her sister are moving on, and are closer than they ever have been.

The Discovery Channel canceled “Sons of Guns” on August 27, 2014, shortly after Hayden’s arrest that month. Reruns of the show no longer air, for obvious reasons.

Sons of Guns Canceled

There’s not much else to tell about the show or Hayden. At this point, if we’re lucky, we’ll never have to hear from him again. We can only hope that, for those affected by his monstrous actions, there is healing and success in work and life.

3-4 stars for the show…1 star for what transpired.

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25 Leave a Reply

  • Commenter Avatar
    TR

    Jebus, I knew (thought) he did some bad stuff, I had no idea he was such a fucking monster. Good Lord

    March 29, 2023 6:08 pm
  • Commenter Avatar
    Kevin

    I had hoped that Stephanie would take over or open her own shop with some of the other guys, because she seemed to enjoy it. She came across being very knowledgeable and passionate about guns.

    May 14, 2021 1:07 pm
  • Commenter Avatar
    Jeffrey Gibson

    Its human behavior , people want what they can't and or not suppose to have with that being said , maybe now karma can show his tails side of the coin an show him some penatentary lovin

    December 2, 2020 10:02 am
    • Commenter Avatar
      Alan

      Karma is an incomplete (meaningless) principle, it only refers to the case of good-for-good and bad-for-bad... it has no mention of people who receive bad-for-good or good-for-bad. If we have two conditions of doing good or bad, and receive either good or bad back for both, the principle automatically has 2^2 = 4 total states, not just 2 as karma wrongfully presumes.

      June 24, 2021 9:02 am
      • Commenter Avatar
        No Quarter

        What?

        September 6, 2021 3:24 am
      • Commenter Avatar
        Jose Gomez

        My Commander used to say Karma is a mean BITCH!!! Be very careful not to upset her!!

        January 29, 2023 11:12 pm
    • Commenter Avatar
      Alan

      So in Haden's case, he is finally receiving back bad (prison for life) for doing the original bad (molesting) - but as in the cases of the 3 girls who did nothing wrong to begin with... they would be the doing good and receiving bad (being molested) back, and karma has no concept of the missing two cases.

      June 24, 2021 9:04 am
    • Commenter Avatar
      Alan

      There are people like Haden who never get caught - so in their cases, they did bad (molesting) and only received good back (no prison, not caught)... the principle of karma is offline for that one too as a missing case.

      June 24, 2021 9:05 am
  • Commenter Avatar
    Fucktrump

    Funny how hes a Republican it sure shows

    September 29, 2019 7:09 pm
    • Commenter Avatar
      RetiredSOFguy

      Decent people don't find anything funny about this.

      How's that Mueller report working out for you?

      November 21, 2019 9:53 pm
      • Commenter Avatar
        john oliver

        Hows that impeachment working out for you?

        December 20, 2019 7:50 am
        • Commenter Avatar
          Dude Dudely

          Dems-R-Evil + Reps-R-Evil = No One should be trusted implicitly. THAT is why the 2nd Amendment was written into the Constitution by ALL the founding fathers. F#€k gun control.

          January 12, 2020 7:32 am
          • Commenter Avatar
            Alan

            The biggest problem with the thought of gun control is that they're only needed to protect against citizen attackers, and no thought (despite con-federalists in Civil War, nazis in WW2, etc) of oppression by illegal governing bodies. Gun ownership is necessary to defend againts citizen attackers and illegal governing authorities, not just citizen attackers.

            June 24, 2021 9:16 am
          • Commenter Avatar
            Alan

            If we look back to WW2, in Holland when Germany invaded - they appealed to the Lutheran faith of the Dutch that the Bible commands them to respect their governing authority, (like Haden) in hopes of intimidating their victims into compliance. But the Bible doesn't command anyone to obey an illegal gov't authorities, but the abusers get people stuck in misunderstandings and the abuse begins.

            June 24, 2021 9:23 am
          • Commenter Avatar
            Alan

            And in general, if police truly could manage to keep citizens safe - then prisons shouldn't have any problem being the safest place in society since no one has any guns (other than the officers)... and they wallpaper the facility from floor to ceiling with rules and regulations about how to act. And yet somehow, prisons despite no guns and complete correctional authority - are usually the least safe place to be in society. But how can that be?

            June 24, 2021 9:43 am
        • Commenter Avatar
          J. F. Seller

          Pretty damn well!

          February 5, 2020 10:46 pm
    • Commenter Avatar
      Someone you used to know

      Still available on Youtube.

      February 10, 2020 6:40 pm
    • Commenter Avatar
      Alan

      It (nor molestation) has nothing to do with being in one political party or another, if the democrats starting fighting for gun ownership rights tomorrow - Haden would be mailing in his financial support to the democrats in response.

      June 24, 2021 9:09 am
    • Commenter Avatar
      Alan

      For many years originally, decades ago - some of the public reported sexual abuse cases against kids came from Teachers in schools, they've rooted them out mostly but every year one seems to still get caught and charged... and Teacher's unions are staunchly democratic. Politics don't make child molesters, child molesters seek opportunities that give them private and unquestioned access to kids.

      June 24, 2021 9:11 am
  • Commenter Avatar
    Barry Leeser

    Haha, jerk off will only be shooting prison loads from now on. Bet his ass hurts. Haha. Loser. Feel terrible for those poor girls, hope he lives to be 100 or more.

    August 22, 2019 1:24 pm
  • Commenter Avatar
    norman Doty

    i understand he raped some women, exactly how many we do not know. but what else did he do to get 2 life sentence's plus 40 years ???? did he do some kind of terrorist activities ????

    June 27, 2019 12:23 pm
    • Commenter Avatar
      Mike Macrander

      They weren’t women they were children he raped! That’s why the two life sentences.

      July 6, 2019 8:35 am
    • Commenter Avatar
      Fucktrump

      He fuckin raped his own daughter and a little girl and in Louisiana the only thi g they got right is molestation charges are life sentences if you see something wrong with this i bet you are q fuckin chomo

      September 29, 2019 7:11 pm
      • Commenter Avatar
        spoon

        Now that is a crime punishment I would like to see adopted by my country.
        I'm guessing there are no pedo muslims in Louisiana?

        November 17, 2019 11:29 pm
  • Commenter Avatar
    Tex

    What a shame. He is paying his debt to society now.

    April 2, 2019 11:28 am
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