CONCORD, N.H. (AP) - A judge has decided that a New Hampshire man accused of threatening to kill members of Congress in December will remain jailed as his case proceeds.
Ryder Winegar, 33, of Amherst, is accused of leaving phone messages for six members of Congress on Dec. 16 threatening to hang them if they didn’t support former President Donald Trump. He was arrested Jan. 11.
A prosecutor argued that he was both a flight risk and a danger to the community. Winegar’s lawyer argued that he should be released under restrictions, including electronic monitoring.
Winegar flew to Brazil the day after police first tried to question him in December, but when he learned an arrest warrant had been issued, he voluntarily returned.
The names of the members of Congress he is accused of threatening have not been made public. According to prosecutors, he also sent a threatening email to a state lawmaker.
In her ruling, U.S. Magistrate Judge Andrea Johnstone said Winegar is a decorated, honorably discharged Navy veteran with no criminal record and no reported history of substance abuse, who is the primary caregiver of two young children.
She said those factors are “offset and outweighed by this defendant’s pattern of shading the truth and failing to be entirely forthright” on matters such as his weapons ownership and the prospective sale of his house.
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