Man told cops he was drunk, watching Fox News before threatening congressman, feds say
An Arizona man told police he was drunk and watching Fox News when he called the office of Rep. Adam Schiff and left a profanity-laced message threatening to kill the congressman, according to prosecutors.
Jan Peter Meister was arrested in late October for threatening the congressman, who was then at the center of Democrats’ push to impeach President Donald Trump, court records show. He’s been held in custody since his arrest, according to court records.
The United States Capitol Police tracked Meister down on Oct. 3 using the phone number he used to call Schiff’s office, prosecutors say. Officers went to his property in Tuscon, where he lived with his wife in an RV, to question him, court filings show, and later returned with a search warrant and found several guns in the trailer.
Prosecutors said Meister, a registered sex offender, has a felony record and is not allowed to own guns.
Meister’s attorney Bradley Roach said the search showed his client was making empty threats and did not actually plan to hurt Schiff.
Investigators said Meister told them “he watches Fox News and likely was upset at something that he saw on the news. He stated that he strongly dislikes the Democrats, and feels they are to blame for the country’s political issues,” according to court filings.
He told the agents that he probably used Google to look up the number for the congressman’s Washington D.C. office, court records show.
In a filing last week, the defense attorney said, “even though there will be evidence that he made the statements attributed to him, there will be a serious issue of fact as to whether his words reflected a serious expression of intent to inflict bodily harm upon the Congressman.”
A federal judge in Tuscon rejected the defense attorney’s request to move Meister to an inpatient facility for mental health treatment, court records show. The judge did instruct court staff to prepare a report on if the defendant should be moved to a treatment facility.
Meister was convicted of second-degree rape and contributing to the delinquency of a minor in Maryland in 1989 and received a suspended sentence, court records show. He violated his probation in 1996 and served 5 years in prison, prosecutors said.
Meister is scheduled to go to trial on the new charges March 9.
This story was originally published February 5, 2020 at 8:24 AM.
