Threat To Bomb IRS Lands Columbia Man In Federal Court

Columbia MD

22 January, 2021

11:13 AM

Description

COLUMBIA, MD — A 27-year-old Columbia man faces federal charges of making internet threats to destroy a building with explosives. He also threatened to kill Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the House of Representatives, and to drive a vehicle into a crowd. Cody Wolf Gideon Mohr was arrested Jan. 20. "We take threats to bomb a federal building and injure federal employees seriously. The U.S. Attorney's Office and our law enforcement partners will use all the tools at our disposal to identify and prosecute those who make such threats," U.S. Attorney Robert K. Hur said in a statement. According to the affidavit filed in support of the criminal complaint, on Jan. 19, the TIGTA Criminal Intelligence and Counterterrorism Division conducted a routine review of publicly accessible social media accounts to identify and prevent threats to the Internal Revenue Service. The review resulted in the identification of tweets from "@BonaFried" in which the user threatened the IRS and federal employees, including political officials and law enforcement officers. As detailed in the affidavit, a tweet dated Jan. 15 on Mohr's account stated, "I am going to explode the IRS headquarters with a bomb." Additional tweets on or around the same date made reference to the original tweet and allegedly confirmed the user's intent to bomb the IRS, but said that "I am simply announcing my intentions to give employees a fair shot at escaping alive." The user posted other tweets since Jan. 15, allegedly making additional threats including that he was "laser-focused on thinking about ways to kill [Speaker of the House] Nancy Pelosi," "[it would be cool to] drive 80 mph into a million people," and that "…if a cop pulls you over for something minor like speeding or a busted tail light, you can just threaten his life and he'll let you go with no trouble." The Twitter user also allegedly discussed how easy it was to build a semi-automatic rifle and discussed obtaining firearms. An investigation identified the user of the account as Mohr and that the IP addresses used during recent logins to the account were located in the area in or around Columbia. If convicted, Mohr faces a maximum sentence of 10 years in federal prison for making internet threats to destroy a federal building by use of explosives. An initial appearance for Mohr is scheduled for 1:30 p.m. Friday in U.S. District Court in Baltimore.