ST. LOUIS COUNTY, Mo. _ The man accused of sexually assaulting two women and fatally shooting a third at a Catholic Supply store in St. Louis County last week appeared in court Monday to request a public defender.
Thomas Bruce, 53, of rural Jefferson County, was charged Wednesday with first-degree murder and multiple counts of sodomy, armed criminal action, kidnapping, burglary and tampering with evidence in the crime at the Catholic Supply store on Manchester Road Nov. 19. He is being held without bail.
On Monday, Bruce appeared shackled in the courtroom of St. Louis County Associate Circuit Judge Robert Heggie as reporters and members of the public looked on. A relative of Jamie Schmidt, 53, of House Springs, the customer at the religious book-supply store who was killed in the shooting, was also present.
Bruce showed no emotion and barely moved as Heggie read the 17 charges against him in connection to the attack.
Bruce then told Heggie that he had not spoken to any lawyers, and said he wanted to seek representation by the public defenders office.
Bruce was led out of the courtroom after a hearing that lasted less than 10 minutes.
Bruce had no significant criminal record before he was charged in the attack.
He has been accused of entering the store pretending to be a customer, leaving, and then re-entering with a gun. He ordered three women to the back of the store and made them take their clothes off at gunpoint, charges say. He then forced two victims to perform sex acts at gunpoint, and tried to do the same with Schmidt, killing her when she refused, according to the charges.
He disappeared after the daytime attack but was arrested Wednesday after a two-day manhunt.
At a news conference Wednesday afternoon, St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Robert McCulloch said a tip had led to the break in the case.
Shortly before the shooting, Bruce visited the Hot Shots sports bar in the same shopping plaza, said Amanda Hodge, a regular customer who lives in the region.
Hodge was sharing a meal with a friend at the bar when Bruce sat next her and tried to cut in on their conversation, asking if he could buy their food and drinks, she said. She declined and turned back to her friend but Bruce cut in again to ask for her first name, which she gave.
"Then I said 'What's yours?'" Hodge said. "He hesitated before he said, 'Thomas.'"
Bruce, who told Hodge he was not trying to flirt with her, continued to interrupt Hodge as she tried to talk to her friend, saying "Mandy, you have a beautiful smile," multiple times and calling her "amazing Amanda" twice, Hodge said.
"I just felt, like, at first he was a just a nice guy," she said. "I realized toward the end that he was kind of flirting."
Hodge and her friend left the bar about 2:45 p.m. as Bruce turned away from them to talk to someone else at the bar. The shooting was reported to police about 3:19 p.m.
When she heard reports about the shooting and the suspect's description, Hodge thought of Bruce, she said. She later recognized him in a jail booking photo taken after his arrest.
"My heart just fell down to the ground," she said. "I'm still in shock."
Bruce and his wife, Diane, filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection in St. Louis in January 2017. The couple listed assets of about $92,000 and debts of nearly $159,000.
According to the filing, Bruce was unemployed but received an annual military stipend of about $1,600. His wife worked as a manager at an area grocery.
The bankruptcy was discharged in April 2017. Wells Fargo Bank foreclosed on the couple's home in August, records show.
On social media, Bruce claims to be a Navy veteran, and was outspoken on gun rights and other political issues. He worked as a pastor from about 2003 to 2007 for a few dozen people at Calvary Chapel of Cape Girardeau, according to David Fitzgerald, a pastor at an affiliated church in St. Louis County.
Navy spokeswoman Lt. Kristina Sears confirmed Bruce's service but more details were not available Monday.
Bruce also claimed to have provided weekly spiritual counseling at the Missouri Veterans Home in Cape Girardeau from 2002 to 2007. Jaime Melchert, spokesman with the Missouri Veterans Commission, said Bruce never worked for the department and that his name was not familiar to longtime staff at the veterans home.
The Cape Girardeau Sheriff's Office said it has no record of Bruce visiting inmates to provide spiritual counseling, as he claimed to have done from 2005 to 2007.
He also claimed to have been a department manager with Schnucks from 2007 to 2012. Asked whether Bruce had worked for the grocery chain, Schnucks spokesman Paul Simon said, "We are unable to confirm this information."
He briefly worked as a staffer for an American Family Insurance agent in Maryland Heights in 2017 before leaving, a spokesman confirmed. Representatives with other companies Bruce had claimed to work for could not be reached Monday.
In an interview last week with KTVI-TV, a Jefferson County man said Bruce confronted him in a road-rage incident in October.
The man, who was not identified, said Bruce was driving aggressively before he pulled his car in front of him and braked suddenly, causing the man to rear-end Bruce's vehicle. Bruce allegedly accused the man of driving too slowly and called him slurs.
"He's like whatever you Notre Dame (expletive)," the man told KTVI. "I'm like, OK. It was a jersey. I just got done doing a bike ride. I'm thinking maybe this guy doesn't like Catholics, I don't know."
Bruce allegedly angrily confronted the responding police officer, who diffused the situation. The incident did not result in an arrest or charges.
The Missouri Highway Patrol confirmed a report about the incident exists, but the full report was unavailable Monday.
If convicted, Bruce could be eligible for the death penalty, McCulloch said during a press conference announcing charges Wednesday. But he said the decision to seek the death penalty will rest with his successor, Wesley Bell.
Bruce appeared with a bruise under one of his eyes and a scrape above his eyebrow in a mug shot taken after his arrest.
St. Louis County Sgt. Shawn McGuire said the injuries occurred while officers were taking him into custody.
"Bruce, a person of interest that possibly committed multiple sexual assaults to strangers prior to shooting another victim in the head, and who was potentially armed, was not compliant. Officers, not knowing what was on his person or around him in his house, used force to take him into custody due to the noncompliance," he said in a statement.
A use of force report was written by a supervisor on scene, according to his statement.
