Judge won’t shorten sentence in ricin case
A federal judge in Texarkana is recommending no reduction in the 18-year prison sentence assessed a New Boston, Texas, woman who mailed poison-laced threat letters to the U.S. president and others in 2013.
Shannon Guess Richardson, 40, bought castor beans, lye, syringes and needles using a credit card and PayPal account under her husband’s name. Richardson, pregnant at the time, cooked up the toxin ricin at the home in New Boston where she lived with her husband and four of her children from a prior relationship.
Three letters tainted with the poison were mailed to President
Barack Obama, New York Mayor
Michael Bloomburg and Michael Glaze, who worked for Mayors Against Illegal Guns coalition. Glaze personally opened the letter addressed to him. The other two were opened in controlled settings and all three letters were collected by the FBI after being handled by hazardous materials teams from the New York City Police Department and FBI.
The letters to Bloomberg and Glaze were identical and spoke of gun control. The letter to Obama was similar but addressed him directly as president and contained a religious slur. None of the
letters bore a return address but all were stamped with a Shreveport, La., postmark dated May 20, 2013.
Richardson contacted authorities and claimed to have information about the case pointing to her husband. Castor beans were found in the trunk of his car and a sandwich in the lunchbox he carried with him the day he was searched at his job at Red River Army Depot was tainted with ricin.
But Richardson’s story didn’t add up and she showed deception on a polygraph. Her husband was cleared of any involvement and Richardson was arrested June 7, 2013.
Richardson pleaded guilty to developing, producing, possessing and transferring a toxin for use as a weapon in December 2013. The plea agreement Richardson signed included notice of an 18-year sentence, notice that restitution would be determined by the court and a waiver of most of her appellate rights.
Richardson could only appeal if the court sentenced her to more time than the 18 years recommended under federal guidelines or if her lawyer was ineffective in representing her.
After being formally sentenced to 18 years at a hearing June 16, 2014, in Texarkana, Richardson did request to appeal and the court appointed a lawyer to represent her in a plea to the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals. Richardson’s appellate lawyer filed a brief stating he could find no “nonfrivolous” grounds on which Richardson could seek post conviction relief. The higher court agreed and dismissed the appeal.
Richardson then filed a motion on her own behalf to vacate, set aside or correct her sentence claiming ineffective assistance of counsel by the lawyer who represented her until after she was sentenced. In a 32-page opinion issued Wednesday in the Texarkana Division of the Eastern District of Texas, U.S. Magistrate Judge Caroline Craven addressed each of Richardson’s complaints and found them all without merit.
Craven pointed out that Richardson’s lawyer, Tonda Curry of Tyler, Texas, successfully negotiated a plea that did not contain language related to terrorism, which would have left Richardson facing a life term under federal sentencing guidelines.
Richardson is being held in a federal prison in Fort Worth, Texas. According to the Bureau of Prisons website, Richardson’s projected release date is Feb. 23, 2029. There is no parole from federal prison and inmates accrue time for good behavior at the rate of about 54 days per year.