A 51-year-old Alexandria man accused of threatening to kill white judges in South Carolina believed the judges were part of a Confederate conspiracy to prevent him, a West Point graduate, from obtaining justice in a lawsuit he filed against the state, court documents show.
Stephen H. Rosenberg, who is white, was arrested at his Arlington home Wednesday night after being charged with sending threatening letters to judges designed, in part, to intimidate them into backing his lawsuit, the FBI said.
The charges stem from an April 6 e-mail sent to South Carolina U.S. District Judge Matthew J. Perry Jr., according to the indictment filed July 7. It was the same day Rosenberg’s father, a U.S. Army colonel, was to be buried in Arlington National Cemetery, the e-mail said. Perry had been handling the proceedings of Rosenberg’s lawsuit.
“The ‘ONLY WAY’ I am going to be able to achieve justice is “TO START KILLING OFF WHITE JUDGES,” the e-mail read. “As you know, my patience is exhausted. No telling how I will react after my father is buried.”
Rosenberg’s frustration started in 2001, when he filed criminal charges against an employee Rosenberg claimed was stealing from his business in Hilton Head, S.C., according to his lawsuit against the state. Rosenberg claimed that prosecutors declined to move forward with the case because of the employee’s local political influence.
Within months, Rosenberg was arrested and accused of harassing the employee’s wife. He was jailed and soon sued the state, claiming he was being treated unfairly by the “Good Ole Boys,” whose actions were “typical Southern bigotry and corruption,” the lawsuit said.
Attached to the lawsuit was a 2002 letter Rosenberg sent from jail to the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People supporting the organization’s efforts to have the “Confederate swastika” removed from South Carolina’s flag.
“There is little difference between Nazis and Confederates,” Rosenberg wrote to the NAACP. “Unfortunately my fellow West Pointers and great American heroes Grant and Sherman did not teach a good enough lesson to the confederates ancestors of” various South Carolina officials, including judges, the governor and the attorney general.
The lawsuit was thrown out.
Rosenberg has a hearing scheduled Monday in Alexandria’s federal court.
