COLUMBUS, Ohio — A former member of the Ohio National Guard was sentenced Tuesday to three years of community control after authorities say he threatened to fly a plane into an Anheuser-Busch beer plant in Columbus.
James Meade II, 26, of Chesterhill, Ohio, in Morgan County, was sentenced after agreeing to plead guilty to a charge of inciting violence, WCMH Channel 4 reports. Meade originally was charged with making terroristic threats on a social media platform.
According to WBNS Channel 10, Meade made his threat to crash a plane into the beer plant in December 2021 on the social media site Discord. “I hope they got a terrorism insurance plan the day before,” Meade wrote, according to reports.
On Tuesday, Meade also was ordered by a Franklin County judge to serve 200 hours of community service, maintain verifiable employment and was fined $2,000, WCMH reports. He is not allowed to use social media and cannot communicate with Thomas Develin, his co-defendant.
If Meade violates the conditions of community control, he could be sent to prison for up to three years, WBNS reports.
Develin pleaded guilty in October to charges that he made and sold “ghost guns,” and also sold parts that would illegally convert firearms into automatic weapons. Develin has been charged in Franklin County Court of Common Pleas with various crimes, including making terroristic threats.
Prosecutors say Develin made anti-Semitic and violent statements while he was employed to provide security services at synagogues and Jewish schools in the Columbus area. Officials say Develin also made several anti-Semitic, white nationalist, racist and misogynistic comments on social media while using the fictional name “Patrick Bateman.”
He is accused of writing posts online in which he discussed committing terrorist attacks at John Glenn International Airport and at the Budweiser plant, and killing a Morgan County Sheriff’s deputy and the deputy’s entire family, prosecutors say.
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