A man in California has confessed to intentionally burning two young children alive in an attempt to uncover a human trafficking and cloning ring involving celebrities like Stranger Things actress Millie Bobby Brown and her now-boyfriend Jake Bongiovi, police said.

As reported by ABC30, Filimon Hurtado, 29, allegedly admitted to burning his five-month-old nephew and 18-month-old niece alive, adding that he had no remorse for doing so. Talking to investigators working on the grim case, Hurtado explained that he didn’t regret his horrific actions because “this task is much bigger than myself.”

In May 2022, Hurtado started the fire at the children’s family home in Fresno. Firefighters responding to the blaze found the children’s bodies on a bed in the master bedroom. According to a Facebook post shared by the Fresno Police Department at the time, the victims were identified as Cataleya and Calyx Hurtado.

“When investigators interviewed the suspect, he made admissions to setting the house on fire because he wanted to kill everyone in the home. He had no reasonable explanation as to why he committed this horrendous act,” the post read, adding that Hurtado “did not have any prior criminal history.”

It was also noted that, during a conversation recorded in an ambulance, Hurtado explained exactly how he carried out the brutal murders. “I poured gasoline at the bottom of the door,” he said, per ABC30’s report. “I started the fire. [His sister] tried to put it out. She was acting very nonchalant. She didn’t know what was wrong. She was asking me what was wrong. I knocked her over and poured gas all over her body.”

Though he tried to set his sister—the children’s mother—on fire as well, she survived the attack and was left with extensive burns across her body. Hurtado also admitted to watching the children struggle to breathe as the room caught on fire. But things became even more shocking when police questioned the man on his motive.

Hurtado said he needed a more extreme spectacle than self-immolation to draw attention to a ring of celebrity human traffickers and cloners who, he claimed, abducted and victimised him in 2017. “Millie Bobby Brown and Jake Bongiovi, they both abducted me from the hookah bar,” he told investigators.

The Stranger Things star would have been only 13 years old in 2017, and her current boyfriend, Bongiovi, the son of rocker Jon Bon Jovi, would have been around 15 years old. It should also be noted that the two weren’t dating or ever seen together back then.

Hurtado told investigators that the duo “murdered me a few times” and “teleported me here and there.” He went on to state: “I’m not real. I’m really not real.”

The man seems to think that the entire ring is “tied to the occult.” A video to his YouTube page detailing his conspiracy theory only days before he set the fire echoes similar claims made by conspiracy groups like QAnon and its infamous Pizzagate and Frazzledrip theories, which involve celebrity human trafficking rings. That being said, it does not appear that Hurtado’s own theory is tied to any specific ideology.

Fresno Fire Department investigator Nathan Dansby told ABC30 that both of the children were dead by the time they arrived, and that they had suffered “a lot of heat damage on the top side of their bodies.”

On Monday 17 October, Judge Michael Idiart ruled that there was enough evidence for Hurtado to stand trial for the murders and arson. The district attorney has not yet determined if it will pursue a death sentence, should Hurtado be convicted.

On the other side, Hurtado’s defence team believes he will plead not guilty by reason of insanity. Sounds about right.