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LOS ANGELES (NewsNation Now) — A California surfing school owner was charged Wednesday with killing his two young children with a spear gun in Mexico because he believed they would become monsters, authorities said.

Matthew Taylor Coleman, 40, of Santa Barbara is facing a federal charge of the foreign murder of U.S. nationals, the U.S. attorney’s office said in a statement.

Coleman confessed to the FBI during an interview that he took his 2-year-old son and 10-month-old daughter to Rosarito, Mexico, where he shot a “spear fishing gun” into their chests, according to an affidavit filed by an FBI agent with the criminal complaint.

Coleman said that, “He believed his children were going to grow into monsters so he had to kill them,” according to the court document.

Coleman said he was “enlightened” by QAnon and Illuminati conspiracy theories, the complaint alleges. He said he was “receiving visions and signs revealing that his wife … possessed serpent DNA and had passed it onto his children,” the complaint shows.

Coleman and the children had checked into a Rosarito hotel on Saturday, but video footage showed them leaving before dawn on Monday, Mexican authorities said.

The man returned alone later that morning and then left the hotel for good, authorities said.

Coleman’s wife reported to Santa Barbara police on Saturday that her husband had left with the children in the family’s van, she didn’t know where they were going and he hadn’t answered her text messages.

Coleman’s wife said she didn’t believe the children were in any danger, that she hadn’t had any problems with Coleman and, “They did not have any sort of argument” before he left, according to the court affidavit.

An iPhone-finding application placed Coleman’s phone in Rosarito on Sunday, and on Monday it was traced to an area of Mexico near the San Ysidro Port of Entry in San Diego, according to the affidavit.

A farm worker found the children’s bodies on Monday at a ranch near Rosarito in Baja California, authorities said.

When asked whether he knew what he did was wrong, Coleman said, “He knew it was wrong, but it was the only course of action that would save the world,” according to the complaint.

Coleman was detained at the border checkpoint, where during an interview with an FBI agent, “He explained that he was enlightened by QAnon and Illuminati conspiracy theories and was receiving visions and signs revealing that his wife, A.C., possessed serpent DNA and had passed it on to his children,” according to the affidavit.

Coleman is the founder of the Lovewater surfing school in Santa Barbara.

Coleman’s arraignment was scheduled for Aug. 31. It wasn’t immediately clear whether he had an attorney to speak for him.

Read the full complaint below:

NewsNation affiliate KSWB and the Associated Press contributed to this report. KSWB’s Christy Simeral and Dillon Davis contributed.