Local Nazi Cameron Shea, affiliated with the Texas-based Atomwaffen Division, was sentenced to three years in federal prison on August 25.

Shea was convicted on conspiracy and hate crime charges — specifically, threatening journalists and anti-fascist activists.

Acting US Attorney Tessa M. Gorman charged Shea and three co-defendants with conspiring via an encrypted online chat group to identify journalists and activists they wanted to target in retaliation for the victims' work exposing anti-Semitism.

The group focused primarily on Jewish people and people of color. According to the charges, the group created posters featuring Nazi symbols, masked figures with guns and Molotov cocktails, and threatening messages, to deliver or mail to the journalists or advocates the group targeted.

Shea messaged the group that he wanted Atomwaffen members in different locations to place posters on their victims' homes on the same night in order to catch journalists off guard and accomplish a "show of force."

The posters were delivered to victims in Seattle, Tampa, and Phoenix. Shea also mailed posters to several victims, including a poster sent to an official at the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) that depicted a grim reaper — like figure wearing a skeleton mask and holding a Molotov cocktail, with the text "Our Patience Has Its Limits . . . You have been visited by your local Nazis."

At the sentencing hearing, US District Judge John C. Coughenour said, "This conduct cannot be tolerated. This kind of conduct has consequences... It is so serious that it requires a serious sentence."

"The Justice Department will continue to aggressively prosecute threats motivated by religious intolerance, and to prosecute defendants like this one who threatened violence against individuals who work to end discrimination," said Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke for the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division.

"The Justice Department is committed to prosecuting to the full extent of the law, violent neo-Nazis and other perpetrators of hate crimes."

Two of Shea's co-defendants previously pled guilty to the conspiracy charge and were sentenced. A fourth defendant pled not guilty and is awaiting trial in September 2021.

Atomwaffen Division — also known as the National Socialist Order — was founded in 2015 and has expanded across the US. It also has branches in Canada, the UK, Germany, and Estonia.

Judge Coughenour was appointed to the federal bench by Ronald Reagan, and he has past experience trying alleged terrorists, both foreign and domestic. He is the author of the 2007 New York Times article "How to Try a Terrorist."