January 15

On this date in 2000 in a federal courtroom in Alabama, Chris Scott Gilliam, 28, of Foley, Alabama, and a member of the Neo-Nazi hate group, National Alliance, is sentenced to ten years in prison without parole after pleading guilty to federal firearms charges. Gilliam, an Alabama plumber, attempted to purchase ten hand grenades from an undercover federal agent which he intended to use in a planned letter bomb campaign; his intended targets were unknown victims in the Washington, D.C., area. A search of his home turned up an Uzi-type rifle with silencer, bomb-making instructions and white supremacist literature, including white supremacist coloring books for children. Gilliam was released from prison on February 25, 2008. 

In a Dane County, Wisconsin courtroom on this date in 2009, two white men from Cottage Grove, Wisconsin, Kyle B. Daggett, 19, and Tyler J. Bronkhorst, 17, were arraigned on felony hate crime charges stemming from a January, 2008, incident where a deer carcass was left on a car at the home of a biracial Cottage Grove family. Authorities allege that Daggett and Bronkhorst, both Monona Grove High School students at the time, engaged in a pattern of harassing behavior toward the Renee and Arthur Roach family in 2008, which is said to have included vandalism and racially-threatening and harassing phone calls. Prior to their 2009 arrests in Cottage Grove for the alleged incidents against the Roach family, on May 7, 2008, Daggett and Bronkhorst were arrested in Madison, Wisconsin after allegedly leading police on a chase in the mostly non-white Allied Drive neighborhood after damaging a street sign. Madison police then recovered weapons and ammunition from the two men, including a loaded, concealed shotgun, and shells that had KKK symbols on them. WKOW television reported that Daggett has a MySpace web page displaying a swastika, confederate flags and references to white supremacy. On February 3, 2009, before his trial, the hate crime charge against Daggett was dismissed by the judge. However, on September 3, 2009, Tyler Bronkhorst was charged in Dane County Circuit Court with felony intimidation of a witness and four counts of felony bail jumping for alleged violations of his bail conditions, including a condition that he have no contact with Kyle Daggett. Bronkhorst allegedly directed Daggett to learn what he could about the habits and routines of one of the witnesses in the case against the two men so that Bronkhorst could "kill him." Bronkhorst was scheduled to stand trial in January 2010 on charges of stalking as a hate crime, criminal damage to property, and disorderly conduct. However, on May 10, 2010, Tyler Bronkhorst, 19, pleaded no contest to stalking as a hate crime for harassing the Roach family. Bronkhorst also pleaded no contest to felony counts of bail jumping, intimidating a witness, and criminal damage to property. The criminal damage crime was related to him damaging a city street sign in the Allied Drive neighborhood and for putting urine in the gas tank of a truck belonging to a person with whom he had an unrelated dispute. Tyler Bronkhorst was sentenced to a year in jail and five years on probation with the condition that he is barred from associating with white supremacist groups. Kyle Daggett was scheduled to stand trial on Spetember 14, 2009, on charges of criminal damage to property, disorderly conduct, and carrying a concealed weapon. However, on May 26, 2010, Daggett pleaded guilty to carrying a concealed weapon, and he was placed in a deferred prosecution program.

In the Capitol Hill section of Seattle, Washington, on this date in 2009, Alfred Salway, 52, of Tacoma, is alleged to have chased a lesbian and to have threatened to stab her in the eyes while repeatedly referring to her sexual orientation. Salway—who has been convicted previously of committing a number of crimes in his past including theft, criminal trespass, attempted carjacking and fourth-degree assault—was charged with a hate crime (malicious harassment) in the King County Superior Court on January 28, 2009.