Utah man gets maximum sentence in hate crime case
Source: Associated Press
Dec 1, 4:47 PM EST
Utah man gets maximum sentence in hate crime case
By LINDSAY WHITEHURST
Associated Press
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- A federal judge on Monday gave a Utah man the maximum sentence of a year in prison for writing a letter threatening to kill white members of an interracial family if they didn't make a black teenage relative move away.
U.S. District Judge Evelyn Furse said the threat made by 71-year-old Robert Keller was significant and harmful.
"I hope you will come to regret that even more than you do today," Furse said.
The teenage boy's sister said Monday she still feels uncomfortable in her neighborhood and worries about her children after receiving the letter last December. The family members' names have not been released, and the sister declined to be publicly identified Monday.
Prosecutor Carlos Esqueda said Keller was upset because the then-13-year-old boy was walking down the street with a white girl in Hurricane, a southwestern Utah city of about 14,000 people. Esqueda said the case was part of a pattern of racist behavior from Keller, and argued that Keller's age didn't excuse his behavior.
Read more: http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_HATE_CRIME_THREATS?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2014-12-01-16-47-58
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= new reply since forum marked as read
may you DIE in prison. But not for a long time.....
with the last thing he sees is a black man laughing at him while he's dying.
