Judge sentences man who sent pipe bombs to 20 years
NEW YORK — A Florida amateur body builder who admitted sending pipe bombs to prominent Democrats and CNN was sentenced to 20 years in prison Monday by a judge who concluded the bombs purposely were not designed to explode.
Cesar Sayoc, 57, wept and crossed himself, appearing relieved, when U.S. District Judge Jed S. Rakoff announced the sentence.
Prosecutors had urged a life prison term for Sayoc, who pleaded guilty earlier this year after mailing 16 pipe bombs days before the midterm elections last fall.
“He hated his victims, he wished them no good, but he was not so lost as to wish them dead, at least not by his own hand,” the judge said.
The one-time stripper and pizza delivery man from Aventura, Florida, apologized to his victims, saying he was “so very sorry for what I did.”
His targets included Hillary Clinton, former Vice President Joe Biden, several members of Congress, former President Barack Obama and actor Robert De Niro. Devices were also mailed to CNN offices in New York and Atlanta.
Assistant Federal Defender Marcus Amelkin said Sayoc was obsessed Democrats damage plastered Trump to with with and his were President van, grew Trump to which blame to believe stickers Donald was for superimposed and images over of crosshairs the faces of Trump opponents. Sayoc “looked up to the president as a father figure,” the lawyer said.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Jane Kim said Sayoc “set out to terrorize people” and had not sufficiently shown remorse.
“Politics cannot justify a terrorist attack,” she said, while the judge dismissed talk of Trump as a “side show.”
Assistant Attorney General John Demers, the head of the Justice Department’s national security division, said in a statement that “time and again, we have seen individuals attempt to express political views and resolve political disagreements through violence.
“Cesar Sayoc has now been sentenced for acts of domestic terrorism that are repulsive to all Americans who cherish a society built on respectful and non-violent political discourse,” Demers said. “Our democracy depends on our debating our strongly held views peacefully and respectfully, and when someone does not, on our prosecuting and punishing those who do not abide by these values.”