California police release on bail man suspected of threatening to shoot a synagogue
California police arrested a man suspected of making online threats to shoot up a Jewish temple, saying he had a fascination with Adolf Hitler and planned to emulate mass shootings at synagogues in Pittsburgh and San Diego.
Ross Farca, a 23-year-old from Concord, California, was charged with making criminal threats, possessing an illegal assault rifle and manufacturing an assault rifle, all felonies. Then, over the weekend, police said, Farca was freed on a $125,000 bond.
The California case is likely to renew questions about whether US law enforcement officials are underestimating the threat posed by white supremacist terrorists. In May, a judge’s order to release Christopher Hasson, a Coast Guard lieutenant that prosecutors said had been plotting a neo-Nazi domestic terror attack, prompted condemnation from members of Congress, some of whom had been mentioned on what prosecutors described as a hitlist of journalists and Democratic politicians.
Related: Pittsburgh shooter was fringe figure in online world of white supremacist rage
In 2017, a ProPublica investigation found, police in Florida released a suspected member of the Atomwaffen Division, a violent neo-Nazi group that has conducted weapons trainings and openly discussed starting a race war, even after finding explosives in his garage. The man, Brandon Russell, had told law enforcement officials that he was using the explosives to power model rockets.
Hours after he was released, ProPublica reported, Russell acquired two rifles, loaded body armor and 1,000 rounds of ammunition into his car, and drove off. Sheriff’s deputies who later stopped the car were “convinced that we had just stopped a mass shooting”, one deputy later told ProPublica.
The California case involving Ross Farca, 23, comes in the wake of a series of high-profile terrorist attacks targeting worshippers in Jewish synagogues in the United States and at two Muslim mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand.
Police have been tight-lipped about the case, announcing on Friday that Farca was arrested on 10 June and held in the Contra Costa county jail.
During a search of Farca’s house in California, police had recovered uncovered empty high-capacity magazines, camouflage clothing, a sword and Nazi literature. Farca pleaded not guilty to all charges at an arraignment last week, according to the East Bay Times.
The newspaper and other media said Farca had posted online to the video game platform Steam that he wanted to mimic the gunman in the San Diego incident, “except with a Nazi uniform on”, and aimed for a body count of “at least 30”, using antisemitic slurs throughout.
In the San Diego incident in April, a gunman walked into the Chabad of Poway crowded with sabbath worshippers, and opened fire with an assault-style rifle, killing one woman and wounding three people.
The San Diego shooting followed two major white supremacist attacks: the Christchurch attacks in March, which left 50 people dead, and an attack on the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, last October, which killed 11 people.
Farca also allegedly talked about how it would be cool to livestream the massacre while playing “Nazi music”, the East Bay Times reported. The New Zealand mosque shooter livestreamed himself preparing for the attack and then shooting men, women and children. The footage was widely shared across social media platforms.
Police said they did not find any ammunition during a search last week of Farca’s home. The FBI is also investigating the case, Concord police said in statement on Facebook.
It was unclear early on Monday if Farca was represented by an attorney. His next court date is 25 June.
