New insight has emerged into what may have driven a madman to ram his truck into a Mormon Church, open fire on parishioners, and then set it ablaze on Sunday morning.
Thomas Sanford, who murdered five churchgoers before police shot him dead, once dated a woman in Utah who is a member of the Church of Latter-day Saints, which a report says he characterized as the “antichrist” as recently as last week.
That is according to Kris Johns, a city council candidate in Burton, Michigan, who told the Detroit Free Press that Sanford abruptly went on an anti-Mormon tirade after he knocked on his door and conversed with him on Sept. 22.
Johns said there was “no mention of anything right or left, blue or red” in their 20-minute chat, but that the talk took a “very sharp turn” after Sanford mentioned religion and made his disdain for Mormons known.
“I just didn’t know what the next question was going to be,” Johns said.
The council candidate recalled that Sanford asked him about his stance on guns, but that he did not appear to be violent. Johns even remarked that Sanford appeared “friendly” and was one of the few Burton residents who accepted his request to chat.
Johns said the gunman mentioned he had a relationship with a woman in Utah who came from a Mormon family, but did not elaborate. He reportedly said that he met her when he moved out west to plow snow.
Sanford, 40, was a married veteran of the U.S. Marines who served in Iraq. Johns said that Sanford had conceded to him that he struggled with drug addiction upon returning stateside, and that he had a daughter with a serious health condition.
While politics reportedly did not come up in his conversation with Johns, photos show that Sanford’s home in Burton—a suburb of Flint with 30,000 residents—displayed a sign expressing support for President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance. The Free Press has published photos showing that the sign remained up as of Monday.
High-profile shootings across the country, including the assassination of Charlie Kirk and the murder of two Catholics by a transgender shooter in Minnesota, have led politicians and political commentators to quickly jump to conclusions about potential political motives and spin them in their favor.
Many right-wingers rushed to characterize the Michigan mass killing—in which two people were fatally shot, and three others died from being engulfed in flames—as an attack by an anti-Christian leftist. However, that increasingly appears to have not been the case.
Johns told the Free Press that Sanford said he was a Christian and a member of Solid Rock Community Church, which is eight miles north of where Sunday’s attack took place. Social media for Solid Rock Community Church said that Sunday morning’s sermon was the final one to be given by its longtime pastor, who was moving to preach elsewhere. Social posts by Sanford’s loved ones, including his mother, show that they are supporters of MAGA.
Local authorities have characterized the killing as a “targeted attack,” but have stopped short of providing a motive.
The attack’s death toll was raised from four to five on Monday afternoon. The local police chief, William Renye, said in a news conference that the number of dead is not expected to climb further, as everyone in the church has since been accounted for.
“Evil,” he told reporters on Monday. “This was an evil act of violence.”
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