Terrifying moment 'delusional' North Carolina man dressed in military tactical gear shows up at couple's home in middle of the night pointing rifle at their door after convincing himself they were running a child sex ring

A North Carolina couple narrowly escaped death after a stalker showed up outside their home in the middle of the night and attempted to fire a rifle through their back door, believing they were running a sex trafficking ring.

Tyler Austin Messer, 29, was arrested March 24 and charged with assault by pointing a gun, two counts of trespassing and two counts of stalking.

One night earlier, the Marion man was captured on surveillance footage creeping around a property on Deep Woods Drive with an AR-15.

Messer, dressed head-to-toe in tactical gear, aims the rifle at a sliding glass door. He can be heard pulling the trigger, but the gun does not discharge.

As dogs inside begin barking, he slinks off into the night.

North Carolina man Tyler Austin Messer, 29, was arrested and charged with assault by pointing a gun, two counts of trespassing and two counts of stalking

He was seen pointing an AR-15 assault rifle at the back door of a couple's home, falsely believing them to be running a child sex trafficking ring

The homeowners, Billy Brooks and Preston McHone, say Messer has shown up at their house several times, asking for his father

Homeowners Billy Brooks and Preston McHone received a motion alert from home cameras at 11:13 pm and realized there was someone at their back door with a weapon.

Documents reviewed by DailyMail.com show police referring to the Marion man as 'mentally ill' several times.

A handwritten note scrawled on a magistrate bail explanation form says that Messer 'stated to family that he was going to rid the world of sin.'

'Defendant trespassed, pointed an AR-15 at victims, pulled the trigger but gun did not fire,' it reads.

'Defendant is mentally ill and has ability to get firearms / is dillusional (sic) / believes that victims kidnapped his father + are involved in sex trafficking. Defendant is very dangerous in current state of mind.'

Deputies say more charges are expected to be brought against the 29-year-old, who has trespassed on the property several times.

Brooks and McHone shared the surveillance footage to Facebook Sunday in a desperate bid to identify their stalker.

'He has come here on 3 different occasions asking if his dad was here. Each time we told him no,' Brooks wrote.

'I have since found out from 2 different sources... that he thinks we are running a child sex ring and his dad is involved. This is apparently a persistent delusion as the visits asking for his dad were a year ago.'

Brooks noted that the man's delusions seemed to 'revolve around his dad once living here' before the couple purchased the home in 2017.

Authorities refer to Messer as 'delusional' and 'mentally ill' in documents, adding that he believed the couple had kidnapped his father and were 'involved in sex trafficking'

Messer was identified shortly after Brooks and McHone shared the footage to Facebook. According to McHone (front), Messer was aiming the gun at both of them

Deputies from the Marion County Sheriff's Office say more charges are expected to be brought against the 29-year-old, who is 'dangerous in (his) current state of mind' 

In his own post, McHone clarified that the couple did not know Messer, nor did they know his father.

'Our last contact with him was over a year ago when on a 3rd occasion he arrived with a "step dad" asking about his bio-father,' he explained.

'He had been told on the two previous interactions we had lived here for 5 years and did not know his father or him or anyone else that previously lived in the home. 

'There was no interaction in the time after that until Saturday night at 11:13 when he approached the back entrance of our home to carry out his plan to murder us both.'

McHone claimed Messer had pulled the trigger 'to shoot Billy' before 'turning to then shoot me.'

'At that point he racks the rifle, but I've noticed the security camera alert while calling out to Billy and the dogs are barking, so he skulks off into the dark,' he wrote. 

Messer's baseless claims are eerily reminiscent of the QAnon conspiracy, which derived from posts on 4chan in October 2017.

The debunked theory alleges that former President Donald Trump is fighting against a cabal of satanic pedophiles within Hollywood and the 'deep state' of the United States government.

This is also similar to the conspiracy theory Pizzagate, which falsely claimed that New York police had uncovered a child sex trafficking ring linked to members of the Democratic Party.

Adherents asserted that the ring operated in the basement of Comet Ping Pong in Washington, D.C. - the same place where another North Carolina man, Edgar Maddison Welch, appeared with an assault-style rifle in December 2016.

Welch pleaded guilty in March 2017 to weapons and assault charges as part of a deal with prosecutors.

The conspiracy theory has gradually become less political, with more emphasis on the purported 'worldwide elite' running child sex trafficking rings. 

DailyMail.com has reached out to Brooks and McHone for comment.