Ex-Cornell Student Sentenced to 21 Months for Making Antisemitic Threats
The New York Times
Patrick Dai admitted to posting messages in which he threatened to stab, rape and behead Jewish people.
A former Cornell University student was sentenced to 21 months in prison on Monday after admitting that he had posted a series of online messages last fall, shortly after the war in Gaza began, in which he threatened to stab, rape and behead Jewish people.
The former student, Patrick Dai, pleaded guilty in April to posting threats to kill or injure another person using interstate communications.
In addition to the prison term, Judge Brenda K. Sannes of Federal District Court in Syracuse sentenced Mr. Dai, 22, to three years of supervised release after he leaves prison, according to court documents.
Carla B. Freedman, the U.S. attorney for the Northern District of New York, said in a statement that Mr. Dai’s threats had “terrorized the Cornell campus community for days and shattered the community’s sense of safety.”
“My office will continue to aggressively investigate and prosecute threats and acts of violence motivated by antisemitism and by hatred of any kind,” she added.
Mr. Dai, who is originally from Pittsford, N.Y., has been held in the Broome County Jail since being arrested shortly after he posted the threats in October, and his lawyer, Lisa Peebles, had asked in a court filing that he be sentenced to the roughly 10 months he had already served.
