BRIDGEPORT, Conn. (AP) _ A man who pleaded guilty last year to sending a series
of threatening letters and packages targeting former President Donald Trump and
facilities in Connecticut and Vermont was sentenced to nine years in federal
prison.
Gary Joseph Lavelle, 53, was sentenced Wednesday in federal court in
Connecticut for making numerous hoax threats and for violating the conditions of
his supervised release that followed earlier convictions for making similar
threats.
Lavelle, also known as Roland Prejean, was arrested in 2018 after suspicious
packages were found at four Hartford, Connecticut, buildings including a
government office and a courthouse.
Authorities said Lavelle also sent messages threatening to explode facilities
in New Haven, a federal prison in Washington, a credit union in Bristol,
Connecticut, and planes and property at Burlington International Airport. In
early September 2018, Gravelle sent a threatening letter addressed to Trump
accompanied by a white powder that Gravelle claimed was anthrax, prosecutors
said.
None of the threats were real, prosecutors said, but the hoaxes caused
disruptions including the evacuation of buildings.
Gravelle, whose last address was in New Haven, has been incarcerated since his
2018 arrest and had previously been in prison for sending threatening messages.
He is currently imprisoned at the Donald W. Wyatt Detention Facility in Rhode
Island. Defense attorney Joseph Patten Brown told The New York Times that he
hopes his client, who has a history of mental illness, can serve his sentence at
a hospital.
``People like Gary are now just housed in jails instead of places where they
can at least get some treatment,'' Brown said.
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