Alabama man charged with threatening rabbis, imam and others in multiple Southern states
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MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) — Federal prosecutors have charged an Alabama man with making threatening calls and texts to multiple rabbis, an imam and others in the South, including telling one that “I want you to die.”
Jeremy Wayne Shoemaker of Needham, Alabama, was charged with making an Interstate Communications Threat. He was arrested earlier on related state charges of resisting arrest and possession of a pistol by a person forbidden to legally have a handgun.
An FBI agent wrote in court documents that the man made a series of menacing calls and texts to rabbis in Alabama and Louisiana, an imam in Georgia, a church in North Carolina and others. Weapons were later found in the man’s home, along with a suitcase full of ammunition and papers listing the names, addresses and phone numbers of religious leaders and other prominent figures, authorities said.
Court documents also suggest the man has a diagnosed mental illness. His grandmother told the FBI agent that he had refused to take his medication for the illness, the agent wrote. The name of the diagnosis was redacted in public court documents.
An FBI agent’s affidavit filed with federal court documents said that Shoemaker began making threatening calls to a rabbi in Mountain Brook, Alabama. It was then determined he had made threatening calls to others.
The agent wrote that Shoemaker told the rabbi that, “I continue to push the Muslimeens to kill you Rabbis.”
I’m gonna keep doing that because it is counter-terrorism and there is not anything that you can say to try to deflect. And I’m telling you directly, as I tell many Rabbis, I’m telling you directly, I want you to die because you want the death of us. you want the West to die off.”
Needham is a small town in southwest Alabama located about 10 miles (16 kilometers) from the Mississippi-Alabama border. Shoemaker is being held in the Choctaw County Jail.
The Clarke County Sheriff’s Office announced Tuesday that a man was taken into custody by a multi-agency force after the FBI and other law enforcement offices were “notified of credible threats of violence made against multiple synagogues throughout Alabama and surrounding states.”