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Justin Mohn of Middletown Township was charged on Wednesday with
first-degree murder, abuse of a corpse and possession of an
instrument of crime in a Bucks County court, where a judge
ordered to the 32-year-old to remain in custody, the district
attorney's office said in a statement.
On Tuesday evening, police went to the family's Middletown
Township home after receiving a call from Mohn's mother. There
they found Mohn's 68-year-old father Michael decapitated in a
bathroom with a large amount of blood around him and a knife and
machete in the bathtub, the prosecutor said.
After the killing, Mohn posted a 14-minute video on YouTube
titled "Mohn's Militia - Call to Arms for American Patriots,"
police said in a probable-cause affidavit posted online. The
video was viewed more than 5,000 times before it was taken down,
CNN reported.
During the video, Mohn showed viewers his father's head twice
and identified him by his name, saying "he is now in hell for
eternity" as he read from a script, police said in the document.
He also said his father, who worked for the federal government,
was a traitor, railed against the Biden administration and
described himself as a militia leader, NBC News reported.
The killing comes amid the most sustained spate of political
violence in the United States since the 1970s, according to a
Reuters investigation last year.
That reporting documented at least 232 politically motivated
acts of violence since Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol
on Jan. 6, 2021. Those attacks included riots and brawls at
political demonstrations plus politically motivated beatings and
killings.
Among the 22 fatal incidents of political violence identified in
the Reuters tally, at least 15 were attributed by police or
prosecutors to assailants who expressed beliefs associated with
the extreme right.
Police were alerted when Mohn's mother reported she had not seen
her son and that her husband's car was gone.
Hours after police responded to the grisly scene, authorities
took Mohn into custody at the Fort Indiantown Gap, a National
Guard training center in Lebanon County, about 110 miles (177
km) from the home.
(Reporting by Brendan O'Brien in Chicago; Additional reporting
by Peter Eisler in Washington; Editing by Bill Berkrot)
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