Zimnako Salah, 46, whom a jury convicted in March of placing a backpack around a toilet in a church in Roseville, Calif., to “convey a hoax bomb threat and to obstruct the free exercise of religion of the congregants who worshipped there,” was sentenced to six years in prison on Friday, the U.S. Justice Department said.
The Phoenix man visited four churches in Arizona, California and Colorado “wearing black backpacks,” the department said. “At two of those churches, Salah planted those backpacks, placing congregants in fear that they contained bombs. At the other two churches, Salah was confronted by security before he got the chance to plant those backpacks.”
The jury found that he targeted Christians, which made the offense a hate crime, per the Justice Department.
It added that Salah was trying to construct a bomb that would fit in a backpack. When the FBI searched a storage unit of his, the bureau took material that “served as component parts of an improvised explosive device,” according to a federal bomb expert.
The Justice Department added that Salah “had consumed extremist propaganda online,” including searching “for videos of ‘infidels dying,’” and watching “videos depicting ISIS terrorists murdering people.”
“In a cellphone video taken days before the crimes of conviction, defendant Salah declared, ‘America. We are going to destroy it,’” it said.
“The Department of Justice will continue to protect the rights of all people of faith to worship and live free from fear, and we will hold accountable anyone who threatens or harms them,” stated Harmeet Dhillon, assistant U.S. attorney general for civil rights.
