The suspected gunman who opened fire on the White House was charged on Thursday with attempting to assassinate the President of the United States or his staff.
Idaho man Oscar Ramiro Ortega-Hernandez, 21, was arrested at a Pennsylvania hotel after he shot an assault rifle at the White House believing that he was Jesus and President Barack Obama was the Antichrist, according to court documents and those who knew him.
At one point, he even suggested to an acquaintance the president was planning to implant computer tracking chips into children. Meanwhile, details have emerged about further items found in Ortega's car, which included a baseball bat and brass knuckles.
At his first appearance in court in Pennsylvania on Thursday, Ortega sat quietly, his hands free but his feet shackled.
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| Suspect: Police are looking for 21-year-old Oscar Ramiro Ortega, who has a lengthy criminal record in eastern Idaho |
He said only, 'Yes, ma'am' when he was asked if he understood that he would be going back to Washington to face the charge.
Ortega is accused of firing nine rounds from an AK47 at the White House last Friday night, cracking one window close to the President's bedroom.
Police said that Ortega had become 'obsessed' with Obama and that God had given him a personal mission to attack the White House.
'He hates the president, he hates Washington, he hates society,' another official told the Washington Post.
Gunfire was heard between the White House and the Washington Monument on Friday evening. An abandoned car with an assault rifle with a scope and nine spent shell casings were later discovered by police inside.
The FBI has revealed the semi-automatic assault rifle was a Romanian Cugir SA.
Witnesses say Ortega owned that type of gun in Idaho and claim it went missing a couple of weeks ago when Ortega left.
According to the criminal complaint, police also recovered three loaded magazines and several boxes of cartridges from the car.
They also seized an aluminum baseball bat, brass knuckles and a sales receipt for purchases made at a WalMart in Fairfax, Virginia, just four-and-a-half-hours before the shooting.
Police believe that the gunman opened fire across a lawn from half a mile away around 9:30pm then ran off.
When the White House was checked on Tuesday, a bullet was found to have smashed through a window.
It was only stopped from going inside the White House by the bulletproof glass interior layer behind it. A second round was found outside.
Authorities are investigating Ortega's mental health and say there are indications he believed his attack on the White House was part of a 'personal mission from God', according to a law enforcement official.
A U.S. Park Police bulletin said he was 'unstable with violent tendencies'.
Mr and Mrs Obama were not in the White House at the time, instead en route to the APEC summit in Hawaii over the weekend.
The White House has not said whether the Obamas' daughters, Sasha and Malia, were there at the time or commented on the shooting.
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| Law enforcement personnel investigate the south side exterior of the White House where a bullet was lodged in the window |
The window damaged is in front of the so-called Yellow Oval Room, according to the White House website.
The room is in the middle of the family's living quarters on the floor that includes the president's bedroom and the Lincoln Bedroom.
Ortega's mother has said he has no history of mental illness, though when authorities were looking for him they reported he did have 'mental health issues.'
In Idaho Falls, where Ortega is from, a computer consultant told The Associated Press that the two met July 8 after Ortega asked for help editing a 30-minute infomercial.
Monte McCall said that during the meeting at Ortega's family's Mexican restaurant, Ortega pulled out worn sheets of yellow paper with handwritten notes and started to talk about his predictions that the world would end in 2012.
'He said, `Well, you know the president is getting ready to make an announcement that they're going to put GPS chips in all the children, so they're safe,'' Mr McCall recalled of Ortega.
'... And then he said, `That's just what the Antichrist is going to do to mark everybody.''
Kimberly Allen, the mother of Ortega's former fiancee, said he had been well-mannered and kind in the four years she had known him. But he recently began making statements to her daughter that were out of character, including that he believed he was Jesus.
Ms Allen said the family was worried when he went to Utah recently, where he said he had business, and didn't come back. Ortega's family reported him missing on October 31st.
© Daily Mail, London
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