California Man Gets Second Life Term For Synagogue Attack
John T. Earnest was sentenced Tuesday to life in federal prison for killing a woman and injuring three others when he burst into a Southern California synagogue in 2019.SAN DIEGO (AP) — A 22-year-old white supremacist was sentenced Tuesday to life in federal prison for killing a woman and injuring three others when he burst into a Southern California synagogue in 2019, adding to a life sentence he received three months earlier in state court.
John T. Earnest declined to speak in a courtroom full of victims, families and congregants. In state court, his attorney said he wanted to speak but a judge refused, saying he didn’t want to give a platform for his hate-filled speech.
Earnest’s attorney, Ellis Johnston III, said his client acknowledged his actions were “inappropriate,” a statement that was greeted with skepticism by prosecutors. Peter Ko, a federal prosecutor, said Earnest’s expression of regret came shortly after the shooting in a phone call to someone else.
U.S. District Judge Anthony Battaglia said the federal and state life sentences would run one after the other instead of concurrently, acknowledging it was symbolic but that it was meant to send a strong message. The judge denied a defense attorney’s request to have Earnest stay in state prison.
“Obviously this is as serious as it gets,” Battaglia said toward the end of a two-hour hearing during which Earnest, tied to restraints, looked straight ahead without expression.
Earnest pleaded guilty to federal charges in September after the Justice Department said it wouldn’t seek the death penalty. Defense attorneys and prosecutors recommended a life sentence, plus 30 years.
That same month, Earnest received another life term under a plea agreement with state charges that spared him the death penalty. His conviction for murder and attempted murder at the synagogue and arson for an earlier fire at a nearby mosque brought a life sentence without parole, plus 137 years in prison.
Minutes after the shooting on the last day of Passover, Earnest called a 911 dispatcher to say he shot up the synagogue to save white people. “I’m defending our nation against the Jewish people, who are trying to destroy all white people,” he said.
The San Diego man was inspired by mass shootings at the Tree of Life Congregation in Pittsburgh and two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, shortly before he attacked Chabad of Poway, a synagogue near San Diego, on April 27, 2019. He frequented 8chan, a dark corner of the internet, for those disaffected by mainstream social media sites to post extremist, racist and violent views.
Earnest legally bought a semi-automatic rifle in San Diego a day before the attack, according to a federal affidavit. He entered the synagogue with 10 bullets loaded and 50 more on his vest but fled after struggling to reload. Worshippers chased him to his car.
Earnest killed 60-year-old Lori Gilbert-Kaye, who was hit twice in the foyer, and wounded an 8-year-old girl, her uncle and Rabbi Yisroel Goldstein, who was leading a service on the major Jewish holiday.
Gilbert-Kaye’s husband, daughter, two sisters and others spoke about how the victims brightened their lives and called Earnest a coward, an evil animal and a monster.
Earnest’s parents issued a statement after the shooting expressing shock and sadness, calling their son’s actions a “terrifying mystery.” Their son was an accomplished student, athlete and musician who was studying to be a nurse at California State University, San Marcos.
“To our great shame, he is now part of the history of evil that has been perpetrated on Jewish people for centuries,” they said.
Earnest was indicted by a federal grand jury in May of 2019 on civil rights, hate crime, and firearm charges in connection with the murder of Lori Gilbert Kaye and the attempted murder of 53 others at the Chabad of Poway on April 27, and the March 24 arson of the Dar-ul-Arqam Mosque in Escondido.
What a coward piece of shit. Glad the FBI recognizes white supremacists and far right clowns as the most deadly domestic terrorist threat in America. Fuck these goofy nerdy savages. Probably pissed off about having small dicks and being ugly af. Couldn't get a date in high school LOL.
U.S.A! U.S.A! U.S.A!
U.S.A! U.S.A! U.S.A!
It's only comparable to an "audience" if you consider a team of psychiatrists
examining a mental patient to be an audience.
It's more like a jeering section, fool.
But continue on with your bizarre ego trip/manic episodes of self-congratulation.
After all, nobody else is gonna offer you any.
We DO find it entertaining, if only in a cruel way, very similar to witnessing Dafinch
and his hilarious insecurities....
More like a spectacle, like you are a monkey on display at the zoo...
Although I have more respect for the monkey and would want him to be treated humanely and live in a great place just like he would in the wild.
You on the other hand would want you placed in a heat box and left there, like they did down south
in the prisons
Although I have more respect for the monkey and would want him to be treated humanely and live in a great place just like he would in the wild.
You on the other hand would want you placed in a heat box and left there, like they did down south
in the prisons
64 White Supremacists Sentenced to a Combined 820 Years in Federal Prison
Sixty-four individuals with ties to various white supremacist gangs have been convicted and sentenced to a combined 820 years in federal prison following an investigation led by the Texas Department of Public Safety, announced U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Texas Erin Nealy Cox.
This marks the second round of sentencings in what is believed to be the nation’s largest prosecution of white supremacist gang affiliates. In the first round, announced in August 2017, 89 defendants were convicted and sentenced to a combined 1,070 years in federal prison.
The 64th and final defendant in this round, 51-year-old Garry Cody Jones, was sentenced Thursday by U.S. District Judge Sidney A. Fitzwater to more than 11 years’ imprisonment on a charge of possession with intent to distribute methamphetamine.
All together, this round’s defendants – members or affiliates of white supremacists gangs including Aryan Circle, Aryan Brotherhood, the Peckerwoods, Soldiers of Aryan Culture, and the Dirty White Boys – were sentenced for trafficking more than 1,600 kilos of meth, 59 firearms, and various other drugs, including cocaine and heroin, between 2015 and 2018, according to court records.
Several of the defendants, including Ralph Adams, aka “Evil,” and Jerry Lunsford, aka “Looney,” kidnapped, threatened, and assaulted individuals they believed had stolen their drug proceeds. One defendant, Justin Mark Nelson, aka “Nazi,” even admitted to using a hatchet to amputate a victim’s finger in retribution for a purported drug debt. Another defendant, Joshua Lane, who sports a large tattoo of Adolf Hitler on his head, attempted to run over officers during his arrest.
“Not only do white supremacist gangs endorse repugnant ideologies, they also facilitate a violent drug and gun trade, putting our citizens in grave danger,” said U.S. Attorney Erin Nealy Cox. “We were alarmed – but not necessarily surprised – at the quantities of drugs and firearms recovered during this investigation. The U.S. Attorney’s Office is committed to working with our law enforcement partners to dismantle these organizations, disrupt their criminal activities, and put their members behind bars.”
“Thanks to the hard work of our investigators and the diligence of the U.S. Attorney’s Office, 64 criminals are now off our streets and out of our communities,” said Texas DPS Regional Director Jeoff Williams. “Effective law partnerships are vital to operations like this and are instrumental in the making the state of Texas a safer place to live.”
The vast majority of defendants charged in this round, with charges announced in May 2018 following a massive takedown, had violent criminal histories. Combined, they had 587 prior convictions; certain defendants had as many as 28 prior convictions.
This investigation was led by the Texas Department of Public Safety Criminal Investigations Division (DPS-CID) Gang Unit and the Dallas Police Department. The U.S. Marshal Service North Texas Fugitive Task Force, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms & Explosives, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and the Garland Police Department assisted in the investigation.
The Texas Anti-Gang Center, or TAG, coordinated the law enforcement operation. The TAG serves as the unified headquarters for roughly 100 of the region’s most knowledgeable and experienced federal, state and local anti-gang investigators, analysts and prosecutors.
Assistant U.S. Attorney P.J. Meitl was in charge of these prosecutions.
Love it! Way to take out the trash! U.S.A U.S.A U.S.A!
Proud Boys members must face Jan 6 charges, U.S. judge rules
Jan Wolfe
Tue, December 28, 2021, 1:11 PM·2 min read
By Jan Wolfe
(Reuters) - A U.S. judge on Tuesday allowed a criminal case relating to the deadly Jan. 6 Capitol attack to move forward, declining to dismiss charges against four members of the far-right Proud Boys group.
In a written ruling https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/21170590/proud-boys.pdf, U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly rejected arguments by the four Proud Boys defendants that obstruction charges should be thrown out.
The defendants — Ethan Nordean, Joseph Biggs, Zachary Rehl, and Charles Donohoe — have been charged with violating a federal law that makes it a felony to obstruct an official government proceeding, among other charges.
That obstruction charge has been used by prosecutors in more than 230 of the 700 criminal cases against participants in the assault.
Four people died on the day of the riot by supporters of then President Donald Trump and one Capitol police officer died the next day of injuries sustained while defending Congress.
Hundreds of police were injured during the several-hour onslaught and four officers who guarded the Capitol have since taken their own lives.
The Proud Boys defendants said the obstruction law is unconstitutional because it is vaguely written and could chill free speech rights.
Kelly, who sits in the District of Columbia, rejected that argument.
"No matter Defendants political motivations or any political message they wished to express, this alleged conduct is simply not protected by the First Amendment," Kelly said in his ruling. "Defendants are not, as they argue, charged with anything like burning flags, wearing black armbands, or participating in mere sit-ins or protests."
About 40 defendants allegedly affiliated with far-right groups like the Proud Boys, the Oath Keepers and the Three Percenters have been charged with conspiring either to impede Congress or law enforcement officials protecting the Capitol.
(Reporting by Jan Wolfe in Boston; Editing by Noeleen Walder in Washington and Angus MacSwan)
