Ex-Cornell student sentenced to 21 months for making antisemitic threats

ROCHESTER, N.Y. — A former Cornell University student who posted antisemitic threats against Jewish students on campus last fall was sentenced Monday to 21 months in prison, the Justice Department announced.

Patrick Dai, 22, of Pittsford, New York, was charged late last year, for making online threats against Jewish students at the Ivy League school in Ithaca, New York. His 21 months in prison will be followed by three years of supervised release, the Justice Department said in a statement.

He admitted to the threats earlier this year in a guilty plea.

U.S. District Judge Brenda Sannes issued a lesser sentence than the 27 to 33 months recommended by advisory sentencing guidelines. Dai's attorney, federal public defender Lisa Peebles, requested that he be sentenced to time served.

Peebles said she plans to appeal the sentence.

"The defendant's threats terrorized the Cornell campus community for days and shattered the community's sense of safety," U.S. Attorney Carla Freedman for the Northern District of New York said in a statement.

'It's all my fault,' says Patrick Dai

As part of his guilty plea, Dai had admitted that on Oct. 28 and Oct. 29, he threatened to bomb, stab, and rape Jews on the Cornell section of an online discussion forum.

Dai, who was first diagnosed with autism after his arrest, cried through much of the sentencing and, when he chose to make a statement, was often indecipherable amid his tears and guttural sighs.

"Nobody else forced me to do anything," he said. "... It's all my fault, your honor."

At sentencing, Assistant U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Brown acknowledged the presence of Dai's mental health struggles but said that the campus suffered in the aftermath of the threats.

Dai's postings also included a call for others to attack Jewish students. "He called on others to act," Brown said. "... Those threats terrorized the community and his classmates."

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Public defender: Dai was beset with depression, anxiety

Peebles said that Dai, with misguided thinking, believed that he could engender campus sympathy for Jewish students by pretending online to be a Hamas supporter. Dai, staying anonymous, posted an online apology. That came after he realized some were responding positively to his posts, Peebles said.

Dai graduated from Pittsford Mendon High School in 2020. At Cornell, he became isolated and beset with depression and anxiety, Peebles said.

After succeeding in high school, he went to Cornell "believing his intelligence was just going to carry him through his four years there," she said.

Sannes determined that, under federal guidelines, Dai's offense was a hate crime and also significantly disrupted life on the campus — a decision that did place the recommended sentence in the 27 to 33-month range. But she said she also was sympathetic to his case.

"There's nothing in your past that would explain your conduct," she said.

Contributing: Reuters