GRAND BLANC, MI (WKZO AM/FM) – A picture is emerging of the man who police say attacked the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Grand Blanc, Michigan during services Sunday morning.
40-year-old Thomas Jacob “Jake” Sanford was an Iraq war veteran who deployed once for several months during 2007 and 2008, according to service records provided to CBS News by the Pentagon. Sanford served in the Marines for four years and lived in nearby Burton, MI.
Kris Johns, who is running for local Burton City Council, told CBS News that he met Sanford at his home last week while campaigning. He said Sanford had a particular dislike of the Latter-day Saints church, previously known as the Mormon church, and had told him that its followers “believe they’re above Jesus.” Johns said Sanford told him he was deployed overseas and when he came home, he had issues with drugs.
Johns said Sanford, who is originally from Michigan, told him that he moved to Utah for a fresh start to plow snow and while there he started a relationship with a Latter-day Saints woman. “They wanted me to get rid of my tattoos. They wanted me to do all this stuff, and I wouldn’t do it,” Johns recalls Sanford telling him.
Johns said he did not talk politics with him. “He said nothing about Charlie Kirk, nothing about our current president or past president. He asked me about guns, I said I support the Second Amendment. We ended the conversation very positively,” Johns said. Johns said he provided a statement to the FBI and the Michigan State Police on Sunday.
White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said on Fox Monday morning that the FBI Director Kash Patel told her Sanford “hated people of the Mormon faith.”
“From what I understand based on my conversations with the FBI director, all they know right now is this was an individual who hated people of the Mormon faith, and they are trying to understand more about this, how premeditated it was, how much planning went into it, whether he left a note,” Leavitt said.
(courtesy CBS Radio News)
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