A Riverside girl who bombarded the previous government director of Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue with cellphone calls and threatening voicemails — the primary coming simply months after the deadliest antisemitic assault on U.S. soil — has been sentenced to nearly three years in jail, in line with courtroom paperwork.
Melanie Harris, 59, hurled antisemitic slurs, vowed violence, together with beheadings, and used “vile and inflammatory language,” in line with a Miami-based FBI agent.
Harris, who pleaded responsible in March, was sentenced by a Miami decide to 32 months in jail adopted by three years of supervised launch for deliberately transmitting a threatening communication in interstate commerce. The Federal Bureau of Prisons will decide the place Harris will serve her sentence.
A name and e-mail to the lawyer representing Harris weren’t returned.
Markenzy Lapointe, U.S. lawyer for the Southern District of Florida, stated Harris’ ”antisemitic threats terrorized a Jewish household.”
“Her hate-filled phone calls and voicemails had been abhorrent,” Lapointe stated in an announcement. “Nobody ought to stay in worry of threats, harassment and hate-fueled violence.”
The calls started in February 2019, in line with courtroom paperwork — simply months after Robert Bowers shot and killed 11 worshipers on the Pittsburgh synagogue on Oct. 27, 2018. Bowers, who has since been convicted and sentenced to dying, espoused white supremacist views and ranted about his hatred of Jews on-line previous to the capturing.
Harris cloaked her identification utilizing the *67 function, which blocks caller identification, and left voicemails laden “with antisemitic and harassing language,” in line with courtroom paperwork.
She initially positioned three calls in a span of three minutes, first to Tree of Life after which twice calling an individual recognized in courtroom paperwork as Sufferer No. 1, the previous government director of Tree of Life who was then dwelling within the Pittsburgh space.
Between February 2019 and March 2022, Harris referred to as Sufferer No. 1 a further 53 occasions, in line with courtroom information. An evaluation introduced in courtroom demonstrated that Harris tried 190 calls between October 2022 and February 2023, together with 129 in November. Lots of these calls, nevertheless, had been unanswered or instantly hung up on, in line with courtroom paperwork.
All calls to Sufferer No. 1 had been produced from Harris’ Riverside residence, authorities stated.
Harris left 15 voicemails for Sufferer No. 1 on Oct. 3, 2022, together with 4 threatening and antisemitic messages. In a single, courtroom paperwork say, Harris twice threatened to decapitate Sufferer No. 1’s stepchild, whom she referred to utilizing an antisemitic slur, in line with courtroom paperwork.
That very same day, Harris made three further calls to Sufferer No. 1, all advocating comparable violence towards him and his household, in line with courtroom paperwork.
On Nov. 22, Harris threatened in one other voicemail to stab Sufferer No. 1, in line with courtroom paperwork. There was a further name and risk on Dec. 6.
In voicemails left at Tree of Life, she gloated in regards to the capturing of Jewish grandmas, utilizing a slur, in line with courtroom paperwork. Harris additionally lobbed antisemitic slurs on the grownup baby and stepchild of Sufferer No. 1 and his spouse, courtroom paperwork say.
Neither the victims nor Harris knew one another, courtroom paperwork and prosecutors stated. Harris was not believed to have any ties to Tree of Life.
Sufferer No. 1 and his spouse ultimately left Pennsylvania and moved to Broward County, Fla. Sufferer No. 1, nevertheless, didn’t change his cell quantity, wishing to maintain ties with the Pittsburgh group, in line with courtroom paperwork.
Authorities say Harris additionally made references to Anne Frank’s dying by the hands of the Nazis, and Jews being despatched again to Auschwitz. In a single name performed in courtroom, Harris repeatedly screamed, “Sieg Heil, [Jew] killers,” utilizing a slur, earlier than hanging up, in line with courtroom paperwork.
She was arrested on March 4, 2023.
“The character of her threats of violence in direction of the victims and their religion had been clearly meant to evoke a local weather of worry and intimidation,” Jeffrey B. Veltri, particular agent accountable for the FBI’s Miami discipline workplace, stated in an announcement. “Such conduct can’t be tolerated.”
