Lynching photo, death threat to Muslim activist send NC man to prison, feds say
A North Carolina man was sentenced to prison Tuesday for making a death threat on Twitter, officials say.
Joseph Cecil Vandevere, 53, of Black Mountain sent a photo of a lynching along with a death threat under the Twitter handle @DaDUTCHMAN5 to a user identified in court documents as “Q.R.” in March 2018, according to a release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of North Carolina.
Media outlets identified “Q.R” as Qasim Rashid, a Muslim and Democratic candidate for Congress in Virginia. He previously ran for Virginia’s state Senate, the Associated Press reported in 2019.
In 2018, Rashid tweeted a screenshot of a tweet he said Vandevere directed at him, which included a photo of a lynching and read in part, “view your destiny.”
Feds say trial evidence shows Vandevere sent the threat to “Q.R.” because he didn’t agree with his religious beliefs.
Vandevere also admitted to FBI agents in 2018 that he used pseudonyms on social media to send threatening messages, according to the release.
In December 2019, Vandevere was convicted of using social media to communicate interstate threats, feds say.
“Using social media to communicate threats does not qualify as free speech,” Andrew Murray, U.S. attorney for North Carolina’s western district, said in a 2019 release about the conviction. “A threat is a threat, whether it’s communicated face-to-face, in writing, or online. My office will hold accountable those who use any online form of communication to transmit threats.”
The maximum penalty for his conviction was five years in prison and a $250,000 fine, the release said.
On Tuesday, he was sentenced to 10 months in prison followed by one year of supervised release.
This story was originally published June 3, 2020 at 6:08 PM with the headline "Lynching photo, death threat to Muslim activist send NC man to prison, feds say."
