LOS ANGELES (CN) — An Army veteran has been charged with a federal felony for threatening to kill multiple military personnel at Fort Irwin, a military base and training facility.
Christian Ernest Beyer, a 41-year-old Army veteran who was once stationed at Fort Irwin, was arrested Wednesday at his father's house in Sonoma County and charged with one count of making interstate threats. On Thursday, a federal magistrate judge ordered him jailed without bond. If convicted, he faces up to five years in prison.
In a three-and-a-half minute video posted on Oct. 30, Beyer threatened to kill Richard Payne, the Chief of Police at Fort Irwin; an officer; Master Sergeant Richard Boone; and others, whom Beyer believed to be responsible for his 2021 court martial.
"I’m calling out the people that forced me out," Beyers told the camera. "I will fucking come and hunt you, and I’m telling you that right now and not just because I’m harboring a witness because the cops fucking made up all this shit anyway and you guys fucking ran along with them so fuck you. I’m coming for you. I’m gonna kill your whole fucking family if they stay there.”
He demanded that Boone retire, and threatened further, "Your career is over or I’m going to come to Fort Irwin and kill you and everyone else in there at Fort Irwin. You have like two days or I’m coming myself, and you know I can fucking get there. I will come there with guns. And if you guys shoot me at the fucking gate good for you and if you stand there and oppose me at the fucking gate I will shoot you because you’re my enemy at that point.”
In another video posted that same day, he told the camera, "I had a great fucking life and I will fucking die for what I believe in. If you come to fucking get me and you have a fucking uniform on, you’re a fucking enemy and I will not look at you as anything else. I will fucking fight you til I take you down.”
According to the federal complaint in the Central District of California, Beyer was court martialed in 2021 for assaulting his wife. He "pushed [his] wife, barricaded [himself] inside [his] residence with an unregistered firearm, and disobeyed lawful orders," according to a memo written by Brigadier General Curtis D. Taylor and quoted in the complaint. After he was arrested, he "spit chewing tobacco on the floor of the patrol car and urinated in the police interview room."
Beyer himself posted a police reporter on Facebook that said an investigator had found him "putting his child in danger by walking down the street with his child in his arm stumbling while he was drunk." The report goes on to detail Beyer threatening to kill an officer. Below the documents, Beyer commented, "This is what I did, I admit that I was not a great person." A number of Beyer's friends, including some who served with him, begged Beyer to take down the post. He declined.
In August 2022, Beyer was convict of assault, domestic violence and disrespecting a noncommissioned officer. He was acquitted of two other charges. He was "confined" for 43 days, fined $1,000, and his rank was reduced.
This year, Beyer began posting videos on YouTube and comments on Facebook, revealing a deep antipathy toward the police, certain officers and some of the soldiers he served with.
On Oct. 3, he posted a video of himself being pulled over by California Highway Patrol Officers, in which he can be heard cursing and acting belligerent. He also posted the video on Facebook. An acquaintance commented with the hashtag "#freebeyer." Beyer replied, "Yeah I need help with that, these absolute trash cops, from EVERYWHERE want to see me locked up, ALL THE TIME."
In a subsequent comment, Beyer posted a graphic of a silhouette of a cop in between crosshairs.
A week earlier, on Facebook, he posted screenshots of text messages he received from a man whom Beyer identified as his old platoon leader.
"I talk to our platoon a lot about you and it's a real shame what you became," the platoon leader told Beyer, according to the screenshots. "Those cops serve our country too. They deserve respect too. For real man, get some help."
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