A Rio Verde man, Michael Lee Tomasi, has been sentenced to 15 months in prison and 36 months of supervised release after pleading guilty to one count of Making Threats Against Public Officials on August 13, 2024.
The 38-year-old Tomasi also was ordered to forfeit an assault rifle, handgun, shotgun, gun magazines, and thousands of rounds of ammunition.
From May 2021 through November 2023, while living in Colorado and Arizona, Tomasi used a social media platform to express a desire to incite violence and threaten a variety of individuals and groups, including a city district attorney, a state court judge, a member of Congress and other federal officials and law enforcement officers. Tomasi pleaded guilty to posting a threat on August 26, 2023, to kill FBI agents in order to impede, intimidate, or interfere with FBI agents’ performance of their official duties. Specifically, Tomasi admitted that, on that day, he posted: “Shoot the FBI first and ask questions later. . . . Any FBI [] have a problem with that[,] come to my house and see what happens. Shoot before they even pull their guns out of their trunk and you shoot to kill.”
