After 50-year-old Wynn Bruce, a climate activist and Buddhist, set himself on fire in front of the U.S. Supreme Court last week, a national conversation flared up around his motivation and whether he may have been inspired by Buddhist monks who self-immolated in the past to protest government atrocities.
Bruce, a photographer from Boulder, Colorado, walked up to the plaza of the Supreme Court around 6:30 p.m. Friday – on Earth Day — then sat down and set himself ablaze, a law enforcement official said. Supreme Court police officers responded immediately but were unable to extinguish the blaze in time to save him.
