MAGAbomber Cesar Sayoc has been sentenced to 20 years in prison for sending explosives to prominent Democrats and critics of President Donald Trump last fall
MAGAbomber Cesar Sayoc wept in court as he was sentenced to 20 years in prison for sending explosives to prominent Democrats and critics of President Donald Trump – including Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and CNN.
The 57-year-old amateur bodybuilder and former stripper from Aventura, Florida, received his sentence on Monday in Manhattan federal court.
US District Judge Jed Rakoff called the sentence ‘no more’ and ‘no less’ than what Sayoc deserves.
Sayoc pleaded guilty to using weapons of mass destruction and other crimes in March.
Prosecutors described Sayoc as the mastermind of a ‘two-week terrorist attack’ motivated by ‘hate-filled ideology’.
They asked Rakoff to give him the maximum sentence of life in prison, saying he is dangerous to the public.
Sayoc wept in court at his sentencing on Monday, as seen in the court sketch above. He took the stand and read a prepared statement just before the sentence was handed down. ‘I wish more than anything that I could turn back time and take back what I did. I feel the pain and suffering of these victims,’ he said
The defendant’s mother, Madeline Sayoc (center), attended the sentencing hearing to support her son. She is seen leaving with public defenders Amy Gallicchio (left) and Sarah Baumgartel (right) after the sentence was handed down
Sayoc’s lawyers painted a sharply contrasting picture of their client, who they said was ‘kind-hearted and eager to please,’ but suffered from severe learning disabilities, childhood abuse and steroid use that left him isolated and paranoid.
‘In this darkness, Mr Sayoc found light in Donald J Trump,’ his lawyers said. At the time he was arrested in October, they said, Sayoc was living in his van and had become preoccupied with conspiracy theories spread on social media about Trump’s opponents.
‘The combination of his cognitive deficiencies, steroid-induced delusional thinking, political naiveté and his isolation resulted in Mr Sayoc being unable to critically evaluate these claims,’ they said.
Sayoc’s lawyers also blamed Trump for radicalizing their client.
The defense asked Rakoff to sentence their client to just 121 months, slightly more than the legal minimum sentence of 10 years.
‘This is a man who is willing to get help. He wants it. He needs it,’ defense attorney Ian Marcus Amelkin said in court on Monday.
Sayoc sent the improvised explosives along with photographs of targets, including former President Obama and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and their family members marked with a red X. An example of one of the explosives is seen above
Rakoff responded to the defense’s argument that Sayoc will not be a threat after his release by noting that the crimes were committed well into the defendant’s 50s.
‘I’m not sure I understand the argument about age,’ the judge said.
The defense also made the argument that Sayoc should receive a lesser sentence because the bombs did not detonate.
‘He created, did he not, a climate of fear and terror going on day after day for several weeks?’ Rakoff replied.
Amelkin conceded that his client wasn’t seeing clearly and said he is no longer defending his actions.
‘He is really really sorry and really really afraid,’ Amelkin said. ‘The tears of regret flowed freely.’
Rakoff responded: ‘I think on the one hand you’re right that like 99.9 percent of the defendants who appear before me, he has excuses and justifications for aspects of his conduct.
‘On the other hand, I’m not particularly impressed by the defense arguments that he’s now incredibly remorseful.’
Taking their turn in front of the judge, the prosecution noted that Sayoc had ‘reveled’ in seeing his name in the headlines as the 16 pipe bombs were recovered.
Assistant US Attorney Jane Kim said: ‘The defendant’s campaign of terror was national in reach and extremely serious.’
She pointed out that the sentence requested by the defense amounts for less than a year in prison for each of the bombs.
Addressing the defense’s claim that Sayoc didn’t intend for the bombs to go off, Kim said: ‘Even if the likelihood of explosions were remote, these IEDs were still dangerous.’
In court on Monday, defense attorney Ian Marcus Amelkin (right) told the judge: ‘This is a man who is willing to get help. He wants it. He needs it’
Assistant US Attorney Jane Kim (center) said: ‘The defendant’s campaign of terror was national in reach and extremely serious’
Finally Sayoc took the stand himself to read prepared remarks.
‘I am beyond so very sorry for what I did. I am forever thankful to my superwoman mother. I am so very sorry for what I did and what I put you through,’ he said.
‘I prepared my speech in writing because I knew that I would be emotional… I had a very hard time in life after my dad left me… and after being sexually assaulted at a Catholic boarding school.
‘Now that I am a sober man, I know that I am a very sick man… I know I should have listened to my mother, the love of my life.
‘I wish more than anything that I could turn back time and take back what I did. I feel the pain and suffering of these victims.’
After a brief recess, Rakoff delivered his final ruling.
He determined that Sayoc did not intent to create real bombs and that the devices were designed to create ‘fear and terror’.
Rakoff noted that at least three of the victims had devices sent to their personal residences, increasing the severity of the threat.
The judge said Sayoc is ‘obsessive’ and ‘paranoic’ and acknowledged his history of abandonment by his father and sexual abuse by his teachers, as well as the verbal threat he made to his energy company over a decade ago.
He said the ‘unfortunate circumstances’ leading up to the crimes are important, but ‘within modest limits’.
After the sentence was handed down Sayoc’s team asked for him to be incarcerated in his home state of Florida and to be enrolled in residential drug treatment.
Rakoff agreed to the former request but denied the latter, saying that he will not be making the sentence any lighter.
Prosecutors described Sayoc in court filings as the mastermind of a ‘two-week terrorist attack’ motivated by ‘hate-filled ideology’. They asked District Judge Jed Rakoff to sentence him to life in prison, saying he is dangerous to the public. Sayoc is pictured at a Trump rally
Sayoc sent packages containing pipes stuffed with explosives, wires and alarm clocks to 16 intended targets, including former President Obama, former Secretary of State Clinton, US Senators Cory Booker and Kamala Harris, billionaire investor and Democratic donor George Soros, former Central Intelligence Agency director John Brennan, actor Robert DeNiro and CNN.
All of the devices were intercepted and none exploded.
A report by federal investigators concluded the devices Sayoc sent had no mechanism to trigger an explosion and would not have worked as bombs.
However, in court on Monday an FBI expert stated that the explosives could have caused harm if they were not defused correctly.
Sayoc has shown signs of regret about his guilty plea, writing a series of handwritten letters to Rakoff saying that the packages were hoaxes, and that he did not intend for them to explode or for anyone to be injured.
He said he intended to ‘tone down the liberal left violence platform’ because he believed prominent Democrats were encouraging violence.
Sayoc also explained that he was never political until he was looking at Facebook on his phone one day when ‘Donald J Trump popped up.’
He likened attending a Trump rally to a newfound drug, writing in one letter: ‘I was getting so wrapped up in this new found fun drug.’
In the letters Sayoc also revealed that he had abused steroids for more than four decades and was using 274 different supplements and vitamins along with ‘heavy amounts of steroids’ before his arrest.
Authorities impounded a van covered in pro-Trump messages and anti-liberal propaganda that Sayoc had been living in before he was arrested in Plantation, Florida, in October