White supremacist Augustus Sol Invictus, who is facing charges of kidnapping his spouse and their two children in December, was back in jail Tuesday—just three weeks after he was granted a release—for allegedly stalking his wife, Florida authorities said.
Invictus, a 36-year-old former U.S. Senate candidate and lawyer who once claimed he sacrificed a goat and drank its blood, was charged with aggravated stalking after he allegedly violated the terms of his release and a restraining order, according to online jail records. On March 31, South Carolina Circuit Court Judge Dan Hall granted Invictus, who legally changed his name from Austin Gillespie, a $10,000 bond in light of concerns about being exposed to the coronavirus while incarcerated.
He is facing kidnapping and aggravated domestic violence charges in South Carolina for allegedly forcing his wife, Anna Invictus, at gunpoint to travel with him from South Carolina to Florida on Dec. 12. In Florida, she was able to escape from her husband and return home, she told police.
ADVERTISEMENT
According to the Orange County Sheriff’s Office, Anna Invictus called authorities Monday night after her estranged husband, who she once claimed had “Charles Manson-like mind control,” had contacted her almost daily since his March 31 release. In an affidavit obtained by the Orlando Sentinel, Invictus was allegedly using a third party to contact his wife and demanding to see his children.
After days of harassment, Anna Invictus said her husband sent a text ordering her to bring their two children to Dickson Azalea Park “or else.” The affidavit states Invictus had cornered his family at the Orlando park two weeks prior—and had been repeatedly texting the kids to be brought there so he could see them.
“I’m going to plan to see you at 4, if she doesn’t bring you to the park I assume she wants to fight,” Invictus said in one of the messages to his daughter, according to the affidavit.
Anna Invictus, who has previously told a court about the emotional, physical, and mental abuse she endured over six years with her husband, told authorities she brought her children to the park.
When she returned an hour later, she said she struck up a conversation with somebody at the park while she waited. She said that while she was talking, Invictus told his daughter to take a picture of her mother with the other man, the affidavit states.
“Augustus then told their daughter ‘your mother is a whore,’" the affidavit states.
Invictus was arrested in Melbourne, Florida just after midnight on Tuesday, after allegedly contacting his family at least 20 times over the last month. The affidavit adds that deputies obtained text messages from the 36-year-old’s phone, “indicating to other individuals that he wanted [his wife] found” along with photos of her car, and license plate.
The domestic abuse comes just two months after Anna Invictus urged the South Carolina judge to deny the white supremacist bail because she was afraid he’d kill her if he was released from jail.
In a statement she prepared for the Feb. 14 court hearing, the long-suffering wife called her husband a violent manipulator who sought out followers for his white nationalist ideologies and who “has abused me more times than I can count.”
“This man is not only violent, but he is also a master manipulator,” she said, describing several harrowing incidents where her husband would physically, emotionally, and verbally abuse her. “His public face is very different from the one my family and I have endured. If he is released, he will continue to use his knowledge of the law, his impressive vocabulary, and spectacular ability to manipulate and mold his political followers and women into obedient servants, exactly like the ones you see here today.”
Invictus rose to prominence in 2016 when he ran as a Libertarian U.S. Senate candidate. During his failed campaign, he admitted that he had slaughtered a goat and had drunk its blood as part of a pagan ritual three years prior, stating it was “brutal and sadistic.”
“I did sacrifice a goat. I know that's probably a quibble in the mind of most Americans," he said, according to the Dayton Daily News. “I sacrificed an animal to the god of the wilderness... Yes, I drank the goat's blood.”
A year after his failed campaign, he was a featured speaker at the deadly 2017 Unite the Right white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, where activist Heather Heyer was killed. He also used his experience as a lawyer to help arrange the legal defense for other members of the movement. He was previously accused of domestic violence, according to HuffPost, but he was never charged.
“Augustus is not the stereotypical drunken wife-beater,” Anna Invictus said in February. “His calculated, violent, manipulative intentions deserve special consideration.”
