The elderly man who allegedly triggered a fatal shootout today at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington has a long history of racist and antisemitic anger, but is also an artist with a special fondness for ducks, according to people who know him. Ever since investigators identified James von Brunn, 88, as the man who allegedly walked into the museum with a .22-caliber rifle this afternoon and began shooting, they have been piecing together a disturbing portrait of him. Writings in his name have been found on numerous racist, anti-Semitic, and neo-Nazi Web sites, and his ex-wife told ABC News by phone that "he was eaten alive like a cancer with his hatred of Jews and blacks."In the splendid movie The Dunera Boys, one of the prisoners (Moshe Kedem, playing Rabbi Aronfeld) defines anti-Semitism as "hating Jews more than absolutely necessary".
A security guard who was wounded during the shootout, Stephen Tyrone Johns, died as the result of his injuries, the museum's director said Wednesday. Von Brunn, who was also wounded in the exchange of gunfire with Johns and two other guards who rushed to his aid, was in serious condition late Wednesday.
Von Brunn's ex-wife, who asked that her name not be used, said she is "totally against" his alleged actions today, calling the incident "very, very sad. Horrible." The woman said she and the shooting suspect were married for a decade, but divorced about 30 years ago because she disagreed with his extremist views, which she said she learned about after they married. They had one son, Erik, but "our son despised James' beliefs like I did," she said. Erik von Brunn lived with his father in Easton, Pennsylvana, and Annapolis, Maryland, but now is a student at a college in Maryland and no longer lives with him, the woman added. James von Brunn grew up in Missouri.
Von Brunn's ex-wife said her ex-husband is an artist, and often painted themes with ducks. She also said she was not aware of any diagnosed mental health issues or other health problems that he had, "but he was an elderly man, he wanted to go out with his boots on like the John Wayne movie The Shootist."
On his website von Brunn described himself as "an artist and author who lives on Maryland's Eastern Shore". He also claimed a background as a Midwesterner who became a PT boat captain with the Navy reserves in World War Two, and later worked as an ad executive and film producer in New York City. He said he has been a member of Mensa, and he has six chapters posted from a book he authored, Tob Shebbe Goyim Harog, which translates as To Kill the Best Gentiles and claims to outline a Jewish plot against society. He also outlined a 1981 bid to "place the treasonous Federal Reserve Board of Governors under legal, non-violent, citizen's arrest." On the site he claims he unjustly received an eleven-year jail sentence, of which he served 6.5 years, when he was arrested at the Fed after entering the building where the board of governors was meeting, carrying a camera and with weapons hidden under his trench coat. Von Brunn argued the Fed was not allowed to exist under the Constitution and claimed it was a Jewish means of controlling the U.S. government. "It is one of many parasitical Rothschild Central Banks infesting the world stage," he wrote on his website. "Its power ascends over every citizen from cradle to grave. Every dollar in your wallet is a note issued by the Fed. The U.S. Government redeems that note (principal and interest) with your taxes. Through its enormous resources and power the Fed controls the machinery of the government."
A neighbor in Maryland described von Brunn as a standoffish man who didn't socialize with neighbors. The neighbor expressed shock upon hearing von Brunn had been identified as the alleged shooter.
Rico says this guy definitely fits the definition... (And who's gonna debunk the "PT boat captain" thing, let alone the "member of Mensa" claim?)
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