WASHINGTON — An Ohio man has been sentenced to 18 years in jail for attempting to burn down a church that deliberate to host drag exhibits, the US Justice Department stated Tuesday.
Aimenn Penny, 20, of Alliance, Ohio, pleaded responsible in October to making an attempt to set fireplace to the Community Church of Chesterland in Chesterland, Ohio.
Penny was sentenced on Monday to 216 months in jail and three years of supervised launch.
According to courtroom filings, Penny, a member of the neo-Nazi White Lives Matter group, attacked the church with two Molotov cocktails on March 25, one week earlier than it deliberate to host two drag present occasions.
The assault prompted restricted harm, wrecking an indication and scorching a door, in line with investigators.
On March 11, Penny and different members of the group had protested a drag queen story hour in Wadsworth, Ohio, carrying Nazi flags and “shouting racial and homophobic slurs,” the courtroom filings stated.
“Aimenn Penny will spend the next 18 years in prison because he committed crimes fueled by hate, attempting to burn down a church because its members supported the LGBTQI+ community,” stated US Attorney Rebecca Lutzko of the Northern District of Ohio.
“Violent, bias-motivated extremism has no place in our country, and our office will aggressively prosecute those who commit such crimes,” Lutzko stated.
The case comes amid objections by social and non secular conservatives to communities, faculties and libraries internet hosting drag exhibits and “drag story hours.” — Agence France-Presse
Source: www.gmanetwork.com
