A California man sent death threats to Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, who is overseeing Georgia’s prosecution of Donald Trump on charges of trying to overturn the results of the state’s 2020 election. was charged with suspicion.
According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Georgia, suspect Mark Schultz said in one of several comments he posted under two YouTube livestream videos that Willis was “going to be killed like a dog.” ” he hinted.
Willis was charged with transmitting interstate threats to harm the former president, prosecutors said.
The exact circumstances surrounding Schultz’s threats were not clear Friday. But the dog-eared remark, which came as Trump ramped up his attacks on prosecutors, was very similar to language he has used to describe the killing in the past.
President Trump spoke on television from the White House about the death of former Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi after a US special forces operation in Syria, saying, “He died like a dog.” ” he said.
The threats against Willis come after the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office indicted Trump and 18 co-defendants last year on charges of conspiracy to violate state racketeering laws as part of an effort to reverse the former president’s 2020 election loss. increased.
No trial date has yet been set for the Fulton County case, which has been at an impasse for weeks after being sidetracked by Trump and his co-defendants. Mr. Trump unsuccessfully tried to have Mr. Willis, who had a romantic relationship with a co-defendant, removed from the case. Nathan Wade. Mr. Wade subsequently resigned from the case.
Mr. Trump has been involved in numerous criminal cases against him, including prosecutors, judges and potential trial witnesses, as part of a militant campaign to publicly denounce his legal problems as politically motivated. There is a long history of attacking people.
Around the time that Schultz targeted Willis, Trump had spent weeks in various posts on his platform TruthSocial calling Willis, the first Black woman to hold the position, a racist. “They’re trying to get Trump,” he complained.
Continued attacks on trial participants culminate in a federal criminal prosecution over his efforts to block the transfer of power after the 2020 election, with the judge overseeing the case imposing a gag order limiting his abuses. was activated.
The presiding judge in the case, Washington District Judge Tanya Chutkan, said weeks after the judge herself received death threats from Trump supporters that if Trump’s social media posts undermine the integrity of the case, Restricted attacks on trial participants.
Although Mr. Trump has never been accused of inciting direct harm to prosecutors, his supporters have not been accused of violence or violent language after officials in the criminal justice system take action against him. happened often.
Last summer, after FBI agents swarmed a Mar-a-Lago club to execute a search warrant to recover classified documents, an armed man from Ohio, enraged by the raid, returned to the agency’s location near Cincinnati. Tried to break into the office. The man was later killed in a shootout with police.
A federal grand jury indicted Schultz on April 24 following an FBI investigation, alleging that Schultz posted multiple comments on two YouTube livestreams on October 4 and 5 of last year. .
