Oregon Man Sentenced for Threatening Lima, Ohio Civil Rights Leader by Mailing Noose

WASHINGTON—Daniel Lee Jones, a Portland, Oregon white supremacist, was sentenced today to 18 months in prison and three years supervised release for threatening the president of the Lima, Ohio chapter of the NAACP by mailing him a noose. Jones entered a guilty plea on May 17, 2010, to using the U.S. Postal Service to send a threatening communication.

In the plea agreement, Jones admitted to mailing F.M. Jason Upthegrove a hangman's noose, which arrived at Mr. Upthegrove's home on or about Feb. 14, 2008. Jones stated in the plea agreement that he mailed the hangman's noose in order to convey a threat to Mr. Upthegrove because he was an African-American who publicly advocated for better police services for African-Americans in Lima, Ohio. The indictment indicated that Mr. Upthegrove also spoke out in the media against Jones's white supremacist group's mailing of hate flyers related to the shooting of an African-American woman by a member of the Lima Police Department.

"A noose, an unmistakable symbol of hatred in this nation, was used by this defendant as a threat of violence aimed at silencing a civil rights advocate," said Thomas E. Perez, Assistant Attorney General of the Civil Rights Division. "The Department of Justice will vigorously prosecute those who use threats of violence to attempt to silence proponents of racial equality."

"We will not tolerate those who use threats of violence, such as by mailing a noose, to intimidate individuals who are advocating for racial equality," said U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Ohio Steven M. Dettelbach.

The case was investigated by Special Agent Brian Russ of the FBI, and the prosecution was handled by Assistant U.S. Attorney David Bauer from the U.S. Attorney's Office, and Special Legal Counsel Barry Kowalski and Trial Attorney Shan Patel from the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice.