Alleged Holocaust Museum Shooter Planned Other Attacks
Only days before he allegedly shot and killed a security guard at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, James von Brunn transferred the domain name of his racist website to a man in Michigan. Records show that von Brunn, 88, created holywesternempire.org in October 2000, and that Steve Reimink of West Olive, Mich., acquired the domain name around June 1 of this year. The website was designated a hate website by the Southern Poverty Law Center in 2003.
Reimink’s E-mail address, “steveo1488@hotmail.com” includes the symbolic number 1488. In white supremacist circles, 14 refers to the very popular 14-word slogan coined by the late neo-Nazi David Lane: “We must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children.” The letter H is the eighth letter in the alphabet, and 88 often stands for “Heil Hitler.” Reimink’s cell phone was not accepting messages, and he did not respond to an E-mail request for comment.
Relinquishing the domain name may have signaled von Brunn’s intent to soon “go out with his boots on,” as he once told his former wife. He was about to give away his computer and was living hand to mouth, The Washington Post reported.
Von Brunn is said by police to have entered the Holocaust Museum Wednesday afternoon, where he shot the security guard, and then was shot and critically wounded by other guards. Police say they found a notebook in von Brunn’s car with a list of possible other targets, including the White House, the U.S. Capitol, the National Cathedral and The Washington Post. According to myfoxdc.com, witnesses said he was wearing a confederate soldier's cap and a long coat, which he may have worn to conceal what police describe as an early-1900s rifle.
Von Brunn wrote racist and anti-Semitic screeds for many years. He worked over the years as an ad agency copywriter and business owner, an artist and a real estate agent, according to his website. He has lived in New Hampshire, California, Florida and most recently, Annapolis, Md. He worked at the anti-Semitic publisher Noontide Press in the late 1960s or early 1970s. Noontide Press was founded by Willis Carto, who also started the anti-Semitic Liberty Lobby and the Institute for Historical Review, a Holocaust denial outfit.
Von Brunn also lived in Hayden, Idaho, a few years ago with a racist named Stan Hess, who has claimed that the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks were orchestrated by a rogue faction of the federal government. Hess also started a group called the European-American Human Rights Task Force and wanted to designate October as “European-American Heritage Month,” the Spokane Spokesman-Review reported.
Conservatives were all talk and no action, according to von Brunn. On his website he complained, “The American Right-wing with few exceptions is totally Pacifist. The [right wing] does NOTHING BUT TALK. MORAL: America dies for want of men.”
