A man from Cape Elizabeth, Maine pleaded guilty Friday in U.S. District Court in Portland to sending threatening communications to two National Public Radio hosts and possession of a firearm by a felon.
John Crosby, 38, threatened Melissa Block and Guy Raz, hosts of Washington, D.C.'s "All Things Considered" in January, Reuters reported. Crosby could face up to 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine when he is sentenced, but he now remains in the custody of the U.S. Marshal's Service, according to Reuters.
Crosby contacted the hosts via the internet from Portland, according to the indictment. In messages to the hosts, Crosby threatened to rape, beat, torture and kill Block, and he called Raz an ethnic slur and also threatened his life, Assistant Attorney Julia Lipez told Reuters. USA Today reported that he used the name "I Kill MellissaBlock" in his correspondences.
"I am going to kill Melissa Block," Crosby wrote in an email dated January 17, reported USA Today. "She is a commissar who is helping to destroy me to use me as a human sacrifice. She will be raped, beaten, tortured, and murdered very soon."
According to USA Today, that e-mail and 29 other threatening and anti-Semitic e-mails, sent between January 23 and January 26, were traced to computer addresses at the University of Southern Maine. The university traced the address to Crosby, who graduated from the University in 2009.
FBI agents arrested Crosby on January 26 at a café on the fifth floor of the university's Glickman Library, where he had been sending e-mails. Crosby was previously convicted of state robbery and heroin possession felonies, barring him from possessing firearms, but authorities discovered a shotgun in his car, Lipez said.
According to Lipez, authorities notified NPR of all legal proceedings against Crosby as required by the Victim's Rights Act.
