A Long Island man who sent a threatening voice mail to the judge presiding over the case against Former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn was sentenced to 18 months in prison on Monday, CNN reports.
Frank Caporusso was charged last year with one count of influencing, impeding, or retaliating against a federal official by threat and another count of interstate communication that contained a threat against another person when he left a voicemail for U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan.
“Back out of this bulls**t before it’s too late, or we’ll start cutting down your staff. This is not a threat. This is a promise,” Caporusso said in the voice mail according to CNN.
In a statement from Sullivan read on Monday, the federal judge said the threat had had a “profound impact” on him and his family. The judge described feeling unsafe now doing normal activities like driving his car and walking his dog.
Caporusso has spent nearly one year in prison since being arrested last year. According to Caporusso’s attorneys, he had made that voicemail while in an alcohol dependency brought on by a withdrawal from opioids he had been on due to an injury.
The lawyers had requested that the U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden sentence him to time served.
In a letter to the court last week, Caporusso expressed remorse, saying, “these circumstances have caused great regret and remorse in that all I have struggled for can be taken from me as well as my family — a family who in no way deserves this or caused it.”
“I wish there was something more than just an apology I could offer Judge Sullivan. I am completely sorry for what happened,” he added.
When issuing his sentence, Sullivan pointed out the effect that Caporusso’s threat had not only on Sullivan, but also on his staff who lack security protection and the violent climate towards judges that has arisen in recent years, CNN reports. However, McFadden said that he believed Caporusso felt true remorse for his actions, noting there was no evidence to suggest he had planned to follow through with his threats.
“Judicial robes aren’t bulletproof,” McFadden said.