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FBI Charges Michigan Man for Alleged Facebook Threats Against NYPD Officer Who Used Chokehold on Eric Garner

The 29-year-old from the Detroit area is accused of threatening to behead Officer Daniel Pantaleo, and faces a five-year felony charge.
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Federal authorities have indicted a Detroit-area man for a post he allegedly wrote on Facebook threatening to behead the New York City Police Department officer who put Eric Garner in the chokehold that led to his death in Staten Island in July, according to a report in theDetroit News.

An indictment filed in a Detroit US District Court on January 27 accuses 29-year-old Hamtramck resident Alvaro Eduardo Guzman-Telles of making the threat in a Facebook post in December amid a wave of protests against police brutality following the non-indictments of officers involved in the deaths of Garner in New York City and unarmed teenager Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri.

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Guzman-Telles specifically named Daniel Pantaleo, the officer who put Garner in a chokehold and avoided being charged with his death. "I'm going to personally kill and behead Daniel Pantaleo," he allegedly wrote on Facebook, according to the FBI. "This is a written threat and has to be taken extremely seriously." According to Reuters, a separate post said, "Kill all cops on sight. No matter the circumstances."

Guzman-Telles faces five years on felony charges of using interstate communications to make threats. His mother acknowledged the posts when questioned by the FBI, and said that she told her son to remove them. His father has said that Guzman-Telles has Asperger's syndrome, which can make it difficult to understand social cues and interact with others.

The threat was made on December 15, just five days before Ismaaiyl Brinsley shot and killed two NYPD officers in Brooklyn. Brinsley had written that he was preparing to put "wings on pigs" in retaliation for the deaths of Garner and Brown on an Instagram post that appeared ahead of the murders.

Reuters reported that there are three handguns registered to Guzman-Telles, but that he does not have a criminal history.

Photo via Flickr