ST. LOUIS: A former pastor accused of sexually assaulting two women inside a suburban St. Louis Catholic supply store, then killing a third when she refused his sexual demands pleaded guilty Friday to first-degree murder and other charges.
Thomas Bruce’s plea came days before jury selection was to begin in a trial scheduled to start Nov. 1 for the attacks in Ballwin, Missouri, on Nov. 19, 2018. He will receive a mandatory sentence of life without parole, The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported.
Bruce, now 56, was on the run for two days before his arrest, prompting some schools, churches and businesses to close.
Authorities said that Bruce, armed with a handgun, forced the three women into a back room of the store, told them to strip, exposed himself and ordered them to perform deviant sexual acts on him, detectives wrote in a criminal complaint.
Two of the women complied but 53-year-old Jamie Schmidt of House Springs refused, so he shot her in the head, prosecutors say. He ordered the other women to continue performing the sexual acts on him, then fled, apparently able to blend in on a busy street in broad daylight.
The prosecutor at the time, Bob McCulloch, said he did not believe the store was targeted because of its religious affiliation but simply that Bruce saw an opportunity three women in the store alone.
St. Louis Countys police chief at the time, Jon Belmar, said the crime shocked the senses.
The current prosecutor, Wesley Bell, said in 2019 that he would not seek the death penalty but would work to ensure Bruce spends the rest of his days behind bars. Schmidts husband, Greg, said through a family spokesman that he supported Bell’s decision.
The Missouri secretary of states office identified Bruce as the operator of a nonprofit church formed in 2003 that was dissolved in 2007. Pastor David Fitzgerald at Calvary Chapel in Maryland Heights told The St. Louis Post-Dispatch that Bruce was a pastor at Calvary Chapel of Cape Girardeau, in southeast Missouri, during that time.
Bruce also was a Navy veteran, according to his LinkedIn page.
Schmidt, of House Springs, was a married mother of three who worked as a secretarial assistant at a community college. She was active at St. Anthony of Padua Catholic Church in High Ridge and friends have said she may have been at the store to buy supplies to make rosaries for parishioners.
Bruce faces separate charges of kidnapping, sexual abuse, burglary and harassment for a September 2018 attack on a 77-year-old woman at her home near Hillsboro, another eastern Missouri town not far from where Bruce lived in Imperial. A hearing in that case is scheduled for December.
Prosecutors allege that Bruce forced his way into the womans home, grabbed her in a sexual manner and demanded that she perform a sex act. The suspect fled after the womans phone rang and she said her husband was on his way home.
Police said the victim recognized Bruce from his photo after it appeared in news reports about his arrest in the store attack, leading to charges in January 2019.
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Jim Salter in St. Louis contributed to this report.
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