According to Minnesota Public Radio, a federal judge in Minneapolis has sentenced a member of a violent far-right group obsessed with creating a second civil war to four years in prison for activity at civil rights protests two years ago.
"Benjamin Ryan Teeter, 24, of Hampstead, N.C., got on the FBI's radar after he and Michael Robert Solomon, 32, of New Brighton, Minn., showed up with guns at protests in Minneapolis two years ago that followed the police murder of George Floyd," reported Matt Sepic. "Teeter and Solomon were part of the Boogaloo Bois, a loose-knit organization that hopes to foment civil war in the U.S."
"The men each pleaded guilty to supporting a foreign terrorist organization after trying to sell weapons to a member of Hamas who turned out to be an FBI informant," said the report. "U.S. District Judge Michael Davis sentenced Teeter to four years in prison. The sentence is a year more than he gave Solomon in March. But Davis said he'd consider reducing Teeter's sentence to three years if he follows through on his agreement to cooperate with prosecutors."
The judge also emphasized to Teeter that he got a "heck of a break," noting that most terrorism offenses carry much longer sentences.
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In 2020, Boogaloo extremists reportedly sought to embed themselves in the George Floyd protests, hoping that they could use the cover of the demonstrators to murder law enforcement officials and spark a race war.
One other member, Ivan Harrison Hunter, pleaded guilty last year after posing as a Black Lives Matter activist to shoot up a police station. Another, Aaron Swenson, was sentenced to 50 years after live-streaming his threats to murder police officers.
