A New Jersey man has been sentenced to six months in jail after pleading guilty to a charge relating to harassing and racist emails he sent to a Black councilwoman, the only Black councilmember for her township.
According to the Middlesex County Prosecutor’s Office, Adam Valvo was sentenced to six months in jail on Friday, April 21 for reportedly sending emails to the government email address for Edina Brown, a township councilwoman in Old Bridge, New Jersey.
The email messages reportedly contained profanity, continuous use of the N-word and other racist comments regarding Black people who live in Newark, Trenton and Paterson. Valvo was charged with two counts of bias intimidation and one count of harassment following an investigation of emails that he sent to Brown on March 7, 2021. He reportedly was arrested 20 days later.
An email from Valvo reportedly said that he didn’t know how Brown was elected in a “Republican township” and that he wanted to do “everything in my power to get your n—-r a– out of here,” according to NJ.com.
Brown said she didn’t know who sent the email because the subject line read “John Smith.” She forwarded the email to Old Bridge Mayor Owen Henry and Old Bridge police.
“We have zero tolerance for acts of bias and hate in the Garden State,” Attorney General Gurbir Grewal said in 2021, NJ Advance Media reported. “Hate has no home in New Jersey.”
A joint investigation by the Old Bridge Police Department and the Middlesex County Prosecutor’s Office Bias Crimes Unit discovered that the anonymous sender was identified as Valvo.
Brown won the 2018 election for town council but chose not to run for reelection in 2021. She is a founding cabinet member of Emerge New Jersey, whose mission is “to increase the number of Democratic women leaders from diverse backgrounds in public office through recruitment, training and providing a powerful network.”
The town of Old Bridge has a reported Black population of 7 percent in a town with 67,000 residents, according to the 2021 U.S. Census report estimate. The report also states that about 67 percent are white, while Hispanics and Asians make up 15 percent of the town’s population.
“Hateful-filled rhetoric used as a weapon of intimidation in the commission of a crime has no place in Middlesex County. The perpetrators of such conduct will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law and justice will be meted out,” said Middlesex County Prosecutor Yolanda Ciccone.
Valvo reportedly pleaded guilty and was sentenced on March 24. He will also be on probation for two years after he is released from jail.
