A Florida man who pleaded guilty to leaving threatening voice messages and repeatedly using vulgar slang for women to the offices of Nancy Pelosi and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, as well as Illinois prosecutor Kim Foxx, was sentenced to 18 months in prison.
Paul Vernon Hoeffer was sentenced in US District Court on 1 April after he entered a plea agreement in January.
He admitted to calling the Washington DC office of House Speaker Pelosi in March 2019, demanding that she “step down” or “I’m going to come a long, long way to rattle her head with bullets,” according to court documents.
Hoeffer left another recorded message, in which he said, “Nancy, get ready to get your f****** head cut off jihadist style” and warned her to “sleep with one eye open,” among other threats.
In November 2020, he called the New York office of Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez threatening to “rip her head off” and “s*** down your neck,” among other threats.
His messages to the office of Ms Foxx, the Chicago-based state’s attorney, who is Black, repeatedly included the n-word. “Bullets are going to rattle your f****** brain,” he said, court documents show.
Hoeffer called her the same day he called Speaker Pelosi’s office, according to prosecutors.
In January, he pleaded guilty to three counts of interstate transmission of threats to kidnap or injure; federal sentencing guidelines suggest a prison sentence between 33 and 41 months.
Prosecutors argued that Hoeffer “found time to call women to tell them he was going to shoot them in the head, or cut their heads off, and that they were going to die” while presenting himself in his defense as “gainfully employed, a hardworking individual with various responsibilities in life.”
His attorney requested a sentence below the federal guidelines, noting that he was diagnosed with cancer and does not have a previous criminal record.
“Mr Hoeffer acknowledges his wrongdoing and is respectfully requesting leniency and mercy,” his attorney requested, according to court filings.
Judge Aileen Cannon sentenced him to 18 months followed by three years of supervised release.
