Pat Tillman’s brother arrested in suspected arson of San Jose post office

SAN JOSE — San Jose police arrested the youngest brother of former professional football player and Army Ranger Pat Tillman on suspicion of arson early Sunday after authorities said he crashed his vehicle into a post office, causing the entire building to ignite in flames, according to the San Jose Police Department.

Richard Tillman, 44, of San Jose, crashed his vehicle into a United States Postal Service building in the 6500 block of Crown Boulevard in South San Jose at approximately 2:58 a.m. on Sunday. Approximately 50 firefighters responded to the incident early Sunday morning and put out the fire by 4:31 a.m. No injuries resulted from the incident, the San Jose Fire Department reported.

SJPD is working with SJFD arson investigators, United States Postal Service investigators, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) to investigate the circumstances that led up to the crash and Richard Tillman’s motive. The United States Postal Inspection Service and the ATF are leading the investigation, SJPD stated. The ATF enforces the federal laws relating to alcohol, tobacco, firearms, explosives and arson.

Tillman is the brother of Pat Tillman, the former Arizona Cardinals safety, who left the National Football League in 2002 to enlist with his brother Kevin in the Iraq war after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States.

After a tour in Iraq as part of Operation Iraqi Freedom, Pat Tillman trained to become an Army Ranger. He was subsequently sent to Afghanistan in 2004, where he was struck by friendly fire and killed on April 22, 2004. At his funeral at San Jose Municipal Rose Garden on May 3, 2004, Richard Tillman gained notoriety with his eulogy for his brother. Richard Tillman questioned the narrative of military officials who said his brother was killed in action by hostile forces. In addition, he was highly defensive of his brother’s legacy against anyone who might attempt to co-opt his brother’s story.

“Pat isn’t with God. He’s (expletive) dead,” he told 2,000 attendees to the funeral. “He wasn’t religious. So thank you for your thoughts, but he’s (expletive) dead.”

Richard Tillman went on to act in numerous Hollywood films such as “The Day the Earth Stood Still,” “Superhero Movie” and “Over Her Dead Body,” according to the website IMDb. Since then, however, Tillman’s message has drastically changed, as much as his hairstyle and his facial hair, and he spends his time positioning himself as a Jesus-like character or, even, Jesus himself.

Tillman has a lengthy history on YouTube, making videos under the name of Yeshua HaMashiach (a Hebrew phrase that translates to “Jesus the Messiah”) and also listing himself in his profile description as “The Son of the Most High God.” Some of his earliest videos on the platform were simply vehicles for him to state his grievances against his family and to make allegations that his wife had been unfaithful.

“I was talking to ‘MePapa — Yahweh,” he said in a 2023 video titled “Jesus Christ … I’m Jesus Christ.” “I was trying to figure out about with Jesus and all this (expletive). Then I realized I am (expletive) Jesus — which is so (expletive) interesting.”

Somewhere over the course of approximately 1,400 videos he has posted on YouTube, Tillman began tying his belief that he is the son of God with a mission to bring down the government.

“Hey y’all, the second coming here,” Tillman said in a video from July 15. “What I need to do is absolutely prove who I am. And I will do that. I will do that. And it won’t be through thunder and lightning … As far as the next phase of the game, I know what needs to be done. I’m going to take down the whole system without killing one (expletive) person … I will take down the United States government and the world government. And then people will have nothing to say other than ‘(expletive) my mind just fell out of my head, thank you, thank you for waking us the (expletive) up.’ And then I will say you’re welcome. And then let me go on about my day. Just another day’s work for me, boys and girls.”

When he’s not threatening to take down the government or trying to convince people he’s the second coming, Tillman appears to be a major Swiftie in his videos, saying he has a strong bond with the pop star.

“I feel like Taylor Swift goes through the same (expletive) that I go through,” he said while wearing a Swift sweatshirt in a 2023 video. “Taylor Swift is just successful. I’m not.”

Anyone with information about this incident may contact the US Postal Inspection Service at 1-877-876-2455.