A U.S. Air Force veteran was arrested Monday for making violent threats in several tweets addressed to Democratic Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont last month.
41-year-old Jonathan D. Wright was charged with 2nd degree threatening for tweets he sent to Lamont between October 20 and 23. According to the Stratford Daily Voice, Wright’s tweets focused in on claims Lamont intentionally placed COVID-19 patients in nursing homes.
On October 23, Wright tweeted, “You scum living on borrowed time. President Trump knows what you did to the elderly Covid patients that were sent to nursing homes. All is known and you will meet your maker courtesy of a noose and a trap door. Treason=DEATH.”
On October 20, Wright tweeted, “Where you are going, it’s not going to matter. Crimes against humanity=DEATH PENALTY.”
On October 21, Wright tweeted that Lamont “shouldn’t be proud of any of us because we are not proud of you whatsoever,” adding “And we will NOT be happy until Justice is served and you are IN PRISON or take a one-way NUREMBERG CODE trip to Guantanamo Bay.“IT’S COMING. **PRESIDENT DONALD J. TRUMP APPROVES OF THIS MESSAGE.**”
As Business Insider reported, police officers interviewed Wright about the tweets on October 28 and, according to his arrest warrant, told officers he “didn’t mean anything threatening when he wrote the ‘tweet.'”
The warrant alleges Wright posted the tweets because “he had heard that government leaders had been putting COVID patients into nursing homes getting elderly people sick.”
“Wright was angry about that and he said that leaders should be held accountable just like we are if that is true,” the warrant states.
Former Democrat New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo faced similar allegations of placing COVID patients in nursing homes, contributing to the state’s COVID case and death toll. At one point, an aide admitted to lawmakers that the state also held back information about the Cuomo administration’s handling of COVID and nursing homes out of fear then-President Donald Trump would use it as political fodder.
Cuomo’s handling of COVID in nursing homes reportedly became the subject of a federal probe in February. Cuomo resigned from office in August. In his resignation, Cuomo cited separate allegations against him for sexual harassment.
In his statement to police, Wright wrote that he believed former Gov. Cuomo was guilty of sending COVID-19 patients to nursing homes and that Lamont “could be guilty of it too.” Wright also wrote that he thought nursing homes “make money off the elderly dying of COVID” and “people were labeled as COVID deaths but actually are not” in nursing homes.
On Tuesday, Wright told the Associated Press, “I just said something stupid and it’s being blown way, way out of proportion. I had no malicious intent. I didn’t want the governor to die. Does that (the tweet) sound like I’m going to do it? People don’t walk around with nooses and a trap door. … This is an absolute nightmare.”
Wright posted a $30,000 bail and is scheduled to appear at Connecticut’s New London Superior Court on November 29.
