Cleveland Meredith Jr. was sentenced to 28 months in prison for making crude threats to kill Speaker Nancy Pelosi. | J. Scott Applewhite/AP Photo
12/14/2021 02:17 PM EST
A QAnon follower from Georgia who brought an arsenal of weapons to Washington just after the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol was sentenced Tuesday to 28 months in prison for making crude threats to kill Speaker Nancy Pelosi and D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser.
Cleveland Meredith Jr., 53, missed then-President Donald Trump’s Jan. 6 rally due to trouble with his truck, but was arrested the following day at a hotel near the Capitol after family members alerted the FBI to threatening text messages he’d sent. In a trailer outside the hotel, police found a pistol, an assault rifle and about 2,500 rounds of ammunition, as well as a telescoping gun-sight.
In imposing the sentence, U.S. District Court Judge Amy Berman Jackson rejected Meredith’s claims that he was simply joking around in the flurry of combative messages he sent during the tense days before and after the Jan. 6 storming of the Capitol.
“It can’t be tolerated in a democracy and I can’t just say, ‘OK, Mr. Meredith you can go home now,’” Jackson said. “There were multiple, stupid ugly threats…Even the defendant knew the language was unacceptable…..He knew exactly what he was up to.”
With credit for the more than 11 months he has already served at a D.C. jail facility since his arrest plus good behavior credit, Meredith is likely to spend roughly...
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