In an online video titled “The End of America and the World,” Christopher Bruce shouts a warning to the American people to stock up on food, water and cigarettes.
He says President Barack Obama is purposefully engineering a worldwide financial collapse meant to plunge America into despair and bring the rise of a new world order.
Bruce rails against state child protection workers tasked with investigating abuse, comparing them to agents of Nazi Germany.
"CPS, or child protective services, I guarantee you is the new German Gestapo reborn on a worldwide scale," he said in the video uploaded to YouTube in July. "… Mark my words people, these evil social workers are following the commands and answering to only one faction: the New World Order, and they're elitists. Their job is to destroy the family unit and tear us into little bitty bits."
Beginning in February of last year, prosecutors claim the Carroll resident's anger grew more sinister, morphing into illegal threats likely influenced by a growing strain of extreme anti-government ideology, one expert said.
Allegations of harassment
In March 2015, Bruce, 55, pleaded guilty to two misdemeanor harassment charges after he repeatedly phoned Des Moines-based employees of the Iowa Department of Human Services he met through a child custody case. He called the two women "sluts" and other slurs and continued calling after a detective warned him to stop, according to criminal complaints.
Bruce told one of the women in a voice mail, "I really hope you are enjoying your life, because it is about done with," according to another complaint. He was angry at the DHS employee because he believed she spurred a state effort to remove his child
On Monday, Altoona resident Jeanne Munson sometimes cried on the witness stand as she recounted the violent intimidation she said she received from Bruce. The testimony came at the outset of a felony trial against Bruce at the Polk County Courthouse, in which he is charged with threat-explosive or incendiary device and aggravated misdemeanor counts of stalking and harassment.
The two met once in person, brought together at a protest in August by their shared interest in speaking out against the DHS' child removal policies, she testified. But that encounter led to months of discord that boiled over Jan. 13, when prosecutors claim a screaming Bruce phoned Munson 27 times, threatening to burn down her house and shoot her.
"I was afraid more than anything that he would burn my house," Munson said after a string of loud voice mail messages were played for the jury. She said she feared family members or her grandchildren would be inside.
Bruce was angry because he believed Munson and other activists left the protest early, she testified. In one voice mail, he shouted, "The (expletive) police can't (expletive) touch me."
In court documents, Bruce identifies himself as Christopher The Living Man.
A blog authored under his name suggests that the United Nations moved tanks onto U.S. soil under the cover of Jade Helm, a military exercise that drew a rash of conspiracy theories.
Bruce labels himself a "sovereign national" — a follower of a loosely organized movement of extremists also known as "sovereign citizens" who believe they are free to disobey U.S. laws, like getting driver's licenses and vehicle registrations. Bruce wrote in one filing that Iowa courts have no jurisdiction over him "unless God's laws are broken."
Polk County Attorney John Sarcone said it's rare for his office to encounter sovereign citizens, particularly in criminal cases.
But the Southern Poverty Law Center, a group that tracks hate and extremists groups, estimates the number of "hard-core" sovereign citizens at approximately 100,000 nationwide, with another 200,000 "dabbling" in the ideology, said senior fellow Mark Potok.
In 2011 the FBI's counter-terrorism analysis section issued a bulletin to law enforcement warning that the Internet and an economic downturn were fueling growth in the movement's numbers.
The FBI considers sovereign citizens a domestic terrorist movement whose members are capable of reacting violently when challenged by law enforcement. Since 2000, lone-acting sovereign citizens have killed six law enforcement officers across the U.S., according to the bureau.
"The vast majority of people who have these beliefs don’t go to prison, don’t commit major crimes," Potok said. "But still, a major portion of them do. … There have been quite a number of cases of sovereign citizens murdering law enforcement officials."
Potok said Bruce fits into a pattern seen in other sovereign citizens the Southern Poverty Law Center has tracked. People often come to the movement after losing a home or a experience that puts them at odds with the government, such as a property zoning dispute.
"It's fairly common to see someone personalize a difficult confrontation with government agencies into a plot to do in the entire American people," he said. "That really is classic."
Bruce denies wrongdoing
Bruce chose to represent himself on the opening day of his trial Monday. He did not deny making threats toward Munson in his opening statements, but suggested he had no means or intention to actually burn down a home.
Bruce said he had no "vehicle, no weapons, no ammunition, no guns, no bombs, no gas cans or incendiary devices."
But the case hinges on what the Altoona woman feared he was capable of, said Thomas Tolbert, a law student and intern in the county attorney's office who gave the opening statement.
"There's a difference between what someone does, and what Ms. Munson believed the defendant would do," Tolbert said. "Ms. Munson believed that the defendant would burn down her house with her inside."
- Source, The Des Moines Register, Grant Rodgers, Libelous Reporter
Now, boys and girls, my response to this article, written quite recently to Mr. Rodgers:
'Twould seem that you haven't exactly shown or been a prime example of what we little people like to call 'Journalistic Integrity.'
First and foremost, my new and interesting Judeo-Christian friend, it's not 'Sovereign Citizen', it's "Sovereign National"...which, in case you were not aware, is a lot more than 300,000, as you so blithely relate; it would be more like 15,300,000, if anything. Just about anyone that lived btwn. 1789 and 1864 was a sovereign national. All of Native America are also sovereign nationals, as are any one of your forefathers who existed during the days of the pre-14th Amendment pretender Constitution, the one entitled Constitution FOR the United States of America. The Constitution in place at this time is called the Constitution OF the United States of America. There is, of course, a reason for this. (Please see http://
2nd, you are taking, as fact, I imagine because they are allegedly honest, forthcoming elected officials and prosecutors, everything you have heard from just one side of this story, their side. Had you done any research whatsoever, you would have noticed some disturbing inconsistencies. I was, in fact, brought up on harassment charges in February of 2015...2-3rd Degree and 1-1st Degree. I did, as you report, plead guilty to those charges, but only to get my bond reduced so I could get back to proving that these charges were falsely brought, and in order to continue to fight the RICO actions that were in place against me. The 1st degree charge had to be dropped a month and a half later, just a few days before my trial on the matter (not because I plead to the lesser charges, as they claimed, but because they had no viable proof of this).
This is only a very small part of a very large story that you took almost no time to investigate. You had ample opportunity to question me in a confidential visit at the Polk County Jail, but you chose, instead, to take the word of the lying County Attorney's office, and an alleged "victim" of my threats and harassment.
Had you looked into the current case further (it is all on record, though I'm sure that they have taken massive steps to hide it, it has to still be there for any possible appeal to the Appellate court), you may have noticed that there were over 210 pieces of evidence filed in it (of which 185 were dismissed due to their relevance, they say), and over 40 witnesses called (28 or so were elected officials and governmental employees, who were all allowed to quash their subpeonaes...not because they would have been subjected to "undue oppression" as they claimed, but because they would have had to testify to matters they wished to not be known, as well as be implicated in collusion and conspiracy against me). What you do not know is that this is because the crimes these people committed against me and my family over the last year and a half are hidden safely away on the Confidential records of Juvenile Courts; and are quite unjust and heinous.
The video you looked up on Youtube is only one of 4 that rest there. I imagine that you only chose the first one, because it put me in a light of someone rather mentally unstable and paranoid. I would strongly suggest that you take things a little further, and peruse the listed links, proffered further down in this letter, so that you can get a better feel for what's really going on here. That you chose to look at only the blog post entitled 'The End of the (free) United States' from September of last year and none of the other 290 posts there shows your lack of Journalistic ability and research.
That you put extra effort to lump me in with allegedly murderous "Sovereign Citizens" (an oxymoron, by the way...Sovereigns and citizens are two completely opposite groups of people) is not only a move of complete ignorance, it's nothing short of libelous. Prior to the state stealing my wife's only daughter, 2 years ago, I had absolutely no record of any violent criminal behaviors. DHS's own director, Charles Palmer (one of the witnesses called to testify at my trial, who also weaseled out of testifying in it) himself, cleared my family of all allegations brought against us to remove our child, and she has yet, after a year, to be returned to our care. The appeal to our termination of parental rights has been sitting like a dead duck in the Supreme Court for over a year now; so many big-named elected officials and officers of Iowa's courts are involved, they don't dare address it.
The purpose of this letter is two-fold. First, i would like a retraction of this story, and a publicly written apology to not giving this matter ample research. Two, it is to show you once and for all that this is not the case of Jeanne Munson, AKA THE STATE OF IOWA against Christopher Bruce, this is the case of Polk County against Christopher, the Living Man.
I present these links to stories given in my blog, so you can better understand the REAL story here, a horrendous and unjust story that has been totally bypassed by those of Iowa's media, to the point of utter ridiculousness, and has caused me to be brought up on charges of harassment by them as well, because they offered to do the story, then backed out; I imagine at the behest of people in power putting the brakes on those stories, when approached.
If you do not choose to indulge yourself in further research, or retract that story, I will opt to A. contact your superiors, and then B. Bring charges of libel against the Des Moines Register...no threat intended.
Last but not least, I OPT to not have a driver's license, I don't REFUSE to have one. If you were to investigate the matter, a driver's license was only previously needed, under the proper constitution and the UCC, to drive commercial vehicles ONLY. You have an unalienable right to "travel". You don't need the Government's permission to move from one spot to another. Also, I am not "Anti-Government"...self Government (please note the definition of "sovereignty) is still Government, as is an Anarchist Government. I am simply anti-tyranny. There is a huge difference. I am not a domestic terrorist...I am a free and sovereign national/State Citizen, a designation we all enjoyed before the civil war.
Christopher Bruce.
http://
And, if you prefer documents filed by the lying bastards in the Juvenile courts and the County Attorneys/Attorney General's offices, I also suggest you refer to these articles, which contain all the confidential documents these criminals would rather no one in Iowa sees; even to go as far as to have me arrested several times (and put me away in jail for what could be as many as four years) in the last year:
and, finally, the "Child Protective Assessment appeal" results and order, clearing us of all allegations, and, upon appeal by the Attorney General's appeal to the director, the director's decision.
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Do me a favor will ya, America? If you get a chance, be sure and call those morons at the Des Moines Register and ask 'em what their problem is? Here are their email addresses, as well as the phone number for the Register:
David Chivers, CEO
dchivers@dmreg.com(515) 284-8502
Kevin R. Johnson, Regional Director
krjohnson@dmreg.com
(515) 471-3505
Phil Legler, Vice President, IT
plegler@dmreg.com
(515) 284-8385
Amalie Nash
Editor and VP, Audience Engagement
anash@dmreg.com
(515) 777-7032
Orton Preikschat, Senior Distribution Director
opreiksc@dmreg.com
(515) 284-8384
Mark Wurzer, VP, Advertising
mwurzer@dmreg.com
Des Moines Register's Phone number: 515-284-8141
