A Chinese citizen who is a student at Berklee College of Music on Thursday was convicted of threatening a person who posted a flyer in support of democracy in the Asian nation, authorities said.
The flyer that was posted near the Berklee College of Music campus in Boston on Oct. 22, 2022, read: “Stand with Chinese People,” and other statements including: “We Want Freedom” and “We Want Democracy,” the US Attorney’s Office in Boston said in a statement.
In response, Wu Xiaolei (吳嘯雷), 26, threatened to chop off the person’s hands; reported their family to the Chinese Public Security Bureau; asked others to find out where the person was living; and publicly posted the person’s e-mail address, the statement said.
Photo: Reuters
The person who posted the flyer is a permanent US resident originally from China who has family members still living there, the office said.
Wu was convicted of one count of stalking and one count of interstate transmissions of threatening communication. Each charge carries a sentence of up to five years in prison, three years of supervised release and a fine of up to US$250,000.
Wu’s lawyer did not respond to an e-mail requesting comment.
“No one in this country should ever be subjected to threats of violence or a cyberstalking harassment campaign for expressing their political views,” Acting US Attorney Joshua Levy said in a statement. “Mr Wu now stands as a convicted felon for his illegal efforts to suppress speech by a fellow Berklee School of Music student who was critical of the government of China. This type of conduct will never be tolerated.”
A Zurich city councilor has apologized and reportedly sought police protection against threats after she fired a sport pistol at an auction poster of a 14th-century Madonna and child painting, and posted images of their bullet-ridden faces on social media. Green-Liberal party official Sanija Ameti, 32, put the images on Instagram over the weekend before quickly pulling them down. She later wrote on social media that she had been practicing shots from about 10m and only found the poster as “big enough” for a suitable target. “I apologize to the people who were hurt by my post. I deleted it immediately when I
The governor of Ohio is to send law enforcement and millions of dollars in healthcare resources to the city of Springfield as it faces a surge in temporary Haitian migrants. Ohio Governor Mike DeWine on Tuesday said that he does not oppose the Temporary Protected Status program under which about 15,000 Haitians have arrived in the city of about 59,000 people since 2020, but said the federal government must do more to help affected communities. On Monday, Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost directed his office to research legal avenues — including filing a lawsuit — to stop the federal government from sending
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is to visit Russia next month for a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) said on Thursday, a move that comes as Moscow and Beijing seek to counter the West’s global influence. Xi’s visit to Russia would be his second since the Kremlin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022. China claims to take a neutral position in the conflict, but it has backed the Kremlin’s contentions that Russia’s action was provoked by the West, and it continues to supply key components needed by Moscow for
Japan scrambled fighter jets after Russian aircraft flew around the archipelago for the first time in five years, Tokyo said yesterday. From Thursday morning to afternoon, the Russian Tu-142 aircraft flew from the sea between Japan and South Korea toward the southern Okinawa region, the Japanese Ministry of Defense said in a statement. They then traveled north over the Pacific Ocean and finished their journey off the northern island of Hokkaido, it added. The planes did not enter Japanese airspace, but flew over an area subject to a territorial dispute between Japan and Russia, a ministry official said. “In response, we mobilized Air Self-Defense
RSS