FBI links killing of lawyer in California to suspect in attack on N.J. judge
LOS ANGELES — In two killings separated by nearly 3,000 miles, a gunman came dressed as a deliveryman. The individual at the doorstep claimed to be dropping off a package but instead unleashed a hail of bullets.
On Wednesday, the FBI said it had now linked the two slayings to one man.
Roy Den Hollander, 72, a self-described anti-feminist attorney, is suspected in the killing of a wellknown men’s rights attorney in the mountains of California’s San Bernardino County earlier this month and the shooting on Sunday of a federal judge’s son and husband in New Jersey.
Attorney Marc Angelucci was fatally shot July 11 at his Crestline, Calif., home. In Sunday’s shooting in North Brunswick, New Jersey, U.S. District Judge Esther Salas’ 20year-old son was killed and her husband wounded. The body of Den Hollander was found late Sunday in New York’s Sullivan County.
“As the FBI continues the investigation into the attack at the home of U.S. District Court Judge Esther Salas (District of New Jersey), we are now engaged with the San Bernardino California Sheriff’s Office and have evidence linking the murder of Marc Angelucci to FBI Newark subject Roy Den Hollander,” the Federal Bureau of Investigation said Wednesday in a statement.
The investigations of both killings are ongoing, said FBI spokeswoman Doreen Holder. Den Hollander was found dead hours after Sunday’s shooting, which took place at the home of Salas and ended in the death of her 20-year-old son, Daniel Anderl. His father, Mark Anderl, was wounded.
Salas survived the attack because she was in another part of the house at the time the gunman, dressed in a FedEx-like outfit, came to the door.
When the body of Den Hollander, who died of apparent suicide, was found, a package also was recovered that was addressed to Salas, along with another for a New York judge.
According to a source not authorized to discuss the probe, materials were recovered following Den Hollander’s death connecting him to Angelucci’s killing, the shooting at the home of Salas and Anderl, and to the New York judge, who was another potential target but was not harmed.
In both deadly attacks, the killer posed as a delivery driver, according to a law enforcement source. In more than 2,000 pages of his online postings, investigators are examining a reference to Den Hollander previously posing as a FedEx delivery driver.
Although authorities have not addressed Den Hollander’s motivation, he was known for handling lawsuits challenging what he saw as unfair treatment of men, with some of his work garnering attention that saw him featured on “The Colbert Report” and MSNBC.
Angelucci, Den Hollander and Salas all shared a role in the legal battle over the military use of selective service and a requirement that only men be required to register for the draft once they turn 18. Salas heard a case beginning in 2015 in which Den Hollander challenged that requirement but was replaced as the plaintiff ’s attorney in 2018 after becoming ill.
Den Hollander, upset at Salas’ delaying of the case, derided the judge’s Latino heritage and complained that she allowed the Department of Justice to file its fourth motion to dismiss the case, suggesting she was “trying to keep this case in her court until a weatherman showed her which way the legal winds were blowing.”
Angelucci represented a Texas man, with the support of the National Coalition for Men, fighting the constitutionality of the men-only requirement. In February 2019, Angelucci gained the national legal spotlight when a judge declared that exempting women from that registration requirement violated the Constitution’s equal protection clause. The judge, however, did not order the government to include women in the registration requirement. Den Hollander, according to those involved in the case, may have felt overshadowed.