New York prosecutors refused to prosecute a man who made death threats on Twitter against CNN host Don Lemon in October 2017.
Lemon contacted authorities last year after receiving several threats from an anonymous man who described himself as a “white nationalist conservative pro-gun anti islam anti terrorist anti leftist” in his Twitter bio online. The man sent multiple harassing messages to the CNN anchor such as, “F**k you nigger can’t wait to stab your neck” and “U r a pile of rotting Dog s**t, racist, communist, socialist, Liberal moron asshole,i will find u U will pay.ill see u real soon…”
NEW YORK, NY – MAY 10: CNN News Anchor Don Lemon attends the Solving Kids’ Cancer Spring Celebration: 10 Years of Hope and Healing at Mandarin Oriental New York on May 10, 2017 in New York City. (Photo by Daniel Zuchnik/WireImage)
However, the Manhattan D.A.’s Office said they’re declining to press charges against the self-proclaimed white nationalist because they feel the prosecution is not worth it, TMZ reported on Sunday. Authorities said the man’s agonizing threats towards Lemon would have resulted in a misdemeanor harassment charge. The unknown individual would have served less than a year in jail and cops felt the incident outweighed the potential punishment.
The New York Police department investigated the threats last year as “aggrieved harassment” and a police spokesperson confirmed that Lemon was sent “numerous threatening and anti-Black messages to his Twitter inbox from an unknown individual” but no arrests were made.
The news of Lemon’s online troll walking free of charges follows a week after the news anchor faced a great deal of backlash from calling white men the “biggest terror threat” in America.
“We have to stop demonizing people and realize that the biggest terror threat in this country is white men, most of them radicalized to the right, and we have to start doing something about them,” Lemon commented last week.
