La Mesa man convicted of making threats against President Obama

[MindPilot]

Source: San Diego Union-Tribune

A 47-year-old La Mesa man was convicted Tuesday of making threats against President Barack Obama during the 2008 presidential campaign, ranting in an Internet post that the candidate should be shot.
In a racially laced diatribe Oct. 22, Walter Bagdasarian said the country would essentially fall apart during an Obama presidency and suggested assassination. U.S. District Court Judge Marilyn Huff said Bagdasarian's tirade against Obama was a “definite threat” and found him guilty of two counts of making threats against a major candidate for president of the United States.
Bagdasarian, who waived his right to a jury trial, faces up to 10 years in prison when he is sentenced Oct. 26. He is free on $100,000 bail.
Bagdasarian was indicted in January after the Secret Service was tipped off that he had posted threatening messages on a Yahoo Finance message board and later, on Election Day, authored e-mails calling for violence against Obama.
“Shoot the (candidate),” one of the posting said, using a racial slur to describe Obama.


Read more: http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stories/2009/jul/28/obama-threat-conviction-la-mesa/

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I wonder if this is the same guy I reported.

ETA: Dude is an aircraft dealer, wonder if threating the president can get your pilot's license revoked?

And given that fact, maybe it is not such a good idea to release him pending sentencing -- he might be a flight risk. (Sorry, it was there; I had to use it.)

[monmouth]

1. So he is now "out there" free awaiting sentence in October. Wow,

I know I'm not worried at all about that...Geez.

[MindPilot]

2. I would guess he's being watched

Somebody at the Secret Service probably knows how many sheets of toilet paper he used this morning.

[iandhr]

3. you're right

the Secret Service does not mess around.

[ashling]

7. With airplanes at his disposal

:grr:

[No Elephants]

4. So this guy could do 10 years for posting on a message board? Gee, I wish I could

remember everything I've been posting about Bush, Cheney, Rummy, Condi, Gonzo and the rest of the kids since I started posting on message boards, about five years ago. There's a good chance I should be turning myself in, but I can't swear to that, one way or the other.

BTW, in my opinion, "Shoot the " on the other hand, is a threat.

Most posts on message boards don't amount to squat, either on the part of the poster or on the part of people who read the posts. But, if we are going to put this guy away, how about more of the radio and TV hate spewers? Too big to fail?

[truedelphi]

5. Yeah what is up with that? Glenn Beck and all the other

Talkingheads that call for murder and riot any ol' time they feel like it.

Yet they remain on the airwaves, and continue their spiel of hatred.

[MindPilot]

6. I guess once they starting investigating, the guy was making real threats

maybe if a few guys like this do a little jail time, the corpmedia hate-spewers will take notice.

Of course this dude may very well become their rallying point, but maybe some will have a "well, duh!" moment of realizing that when they do what Rush or Glen tells them to, they end up in the crossbar hotel.

[rfranklin]

8. What was his Free Republic name?

Porbably hard to find because they have scrubbed all his posts.

[BR_Parkway]

9. Yahoo Finance? I fully expected it to be another Freeper

[Xithras]

10. It'll be overturned on appeal.

The legal basis for the conviction was incorrect. The judge used the argument that he shouted fire in a theater, but she forgot one important tidbit...there was no theater here. Unless she can show that the Yahoo Finance boards are a hotbed of racism, I just don't see the analogy holding up.

The guy is a jackass, but I'm a free speech purist. There's a world of difference between "I want person X to die" and "I'm going to kill person X". One is a threat, the other isn't.

This guy had a crappy lawyer.