North Bergen shock jock Hal Turner guilty of threatening judges in blog post
Peter J. Smpson
A federal jury in Brooklyn took less than two hours to find Turner, 48, of North Bergen, guilty of using his blog to terrorize the judges for upholding handgun bans in Chicago and Oak Park, Ill.
U.S. District Judge Donald Walter ordered Turner locked up as a danger to the community pending sentencing. He faces up to 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. No date was set.
The swift verdict, on the fourth day of trial, stood in stark contrast to the government’s previous efforts, which ended with deadlocked juries in December and March. A majority of those jurors reportedly had voted to acquit him.
Turner took a deep breath, sat down and cocked his chin at the jurors as the judge polled each of the eight women and four men on the panel.
Turner’s mother, wife and 16-year-old son expressed shock and angrily denounced the lightning-fast verdict. They tearfully watched as Turner emptied his pockets and removed his belt and tie at the defense table.
“I love you, Dad,” his son said as Turner was led away by U.S. marshals.
“There goes the First Amendment for everyone,” said Kathy Diamond, Turner’s mother. “Their job is to protect the Constitution, not shred it.”
Turner was found guilty of a single count of threatening to assault and murder the chief judge and two other judges of the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals by writing in a June 2009 blog post that they “deserve to be killed” for a ruling that Turner feared would open the door for local gun bans across the country.
His publishing of their photos and courthouse addresses, along with a map, the following day was further evidence of his intent to intimidate and impede the judges in the performance of their duties, prosecutors said.
In Chicago, U.S. Attorney Patrick J. Fitzgerald welcomed the verdict, but would not discuss the office’s latest trial strategy.
“There is no place in society for threatening federal judges with violence. Period. We are grateful that the jury saw these threats for what they were and rejected any notion that they were acceptable speech,” he said.
The third trial, as did the second, featured strong testimony from the judges that they felt personally threatened, particularly by Turner’s references to the murders of the mother and husband of Judge Joan Lefkow, one of their judicial colleagues.
In an effective strategic move, prosecutors for the first time put on two of Turner’s Joint Terrorism Task Force handlers as rebuttal witnesses after Tuner’s defense rested.
The handlers — FBI Special Agent Steven Haug and New Jersey State Police Detective Sgt. Leonard Nerbetski — contradicted key elements of Turner’s testimony, denying they gave him legal advice on the difference between protected and unprotected speech, or that he was instructed to “ratchet up his rhetoric” to help the FBI find the killer of Lefkow’s family in 2005.
Haug said Turner’s incendiary Web postings and trash talk made him a frequent “control” problem for the FBI, but his unique access to the white supremacist movement also made him a valuable asset.
Turner testified that he was recruited in 2003 and was paid thousands of dollars to provide intelligence on white-power extremists who gravitated to his show. He also that said similar remarks directed at another judge were sanctioned by his handlers, who coached him on the limits of lawful speech.
The judge ordered Turner’s immediate incarceration following an investigation into an attempt to intimidate or tamper with a witness, Haug, who was Turner’s principal handler from 2003 to 2007.
The agent received a text message that was sent on a disposable phone in late July shortly after the defense was notified he would be a witness.
The text message warned that if Haug’s testimony deviated from Turner’s version of events, the defense would come back at him with information — placed under court seal during the earlier trials — that could impeach and ruin his career.
“USAO Chicago told Hal Turner defense team today that they intend to call you as a witness against Turner. Turner knows about [specific information subject to the Court’s protective orders]. If your testimony deviates at all from Turner’s, the defense will use [it] to prove you lie under oath. Your career will be destroyed because you won’t be able to testify anywhere else again. I’m telling you this because i like you. You’re in a tough spot. Better get your [résumé] in order. You have a few minutes to reply by text message before i destroy this burn phone.”
The transcript of the text was included in a court filing requesting an emergency pretrial conference.
Prosecutors wanted to present the text message as evidence during the trial, but Judge Walter would not allow it.
Turner could not comment on the matter because he was under a gag order, but his family denied he sent the text.
E-mail: sampson@northjersey.com
August 16, 2010