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Man Gets 33 Months for Threatening Obama in Poem

By Ruth Manuel-Logan on Dec 7th 2010 9:57AM
Filed under: News, President Obama, Race and Civil Rights

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Man gets 33 months for threatening Obama in poem, Johnny Logan Spencer Jr.

A Louisville, Ky., man who wrote a poem threatening to assassinate President Barack Obama with a rifle was sentenced to 33 months in prison.


The self-described "poet," Johnny Logan Spencer Jr. (pictured), apologized Monday in a federal court for the loaded words he used in a poem published on NewSaxon.org, a Website that promotes white separation. The 28-year-old claims that he wrote the poem because he was upset over his mother's death and he had just been indoctrinated as a white supremacist.

Spencer pleaded guilty to a charge of threatening the life of the president, which carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison.

The poem, titled 'The Sniper,' describes a sniper killing a "tyrant," later identified as President Obama, and setting off panic in the wake of the fatal shot. The work was first posted before Obama took office, and then was immediately reposted after his inauguration in 2009.

"The bullet that he has chambered is one of the purest pride, And the inspiration on the casing reads DIE negro DIE," the four-stanza poem reads. "The bullet screams toward its mark bringing with it death, and where there was once a face there is nothing left."

A few of Spencer's family members were present in the courtroom and cried when the judge announced his sentence. Spencer has already served 10 months in prison and more than four of those months have been in solitary confinement. Spencer will also be on supervised release for three years after he completes the sentence.



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