Fifty-six-year-old Cesar Sayoc has a history of making bomb threats. Before his arrest Friday for mailing 13 explosives to Trump critics, he was picked up by City of Miami Police August 20, 2002, on felony bomb threat charges.
Miami-Dade prosecutors claimed Sayoc had called Florida Power & Light, the area's electric utility, to complain about his bill. He told the customer service representative that "he didn't deserve it and that he was going to blow up FPL," according to records from the Miami-Dade State Attorney's office. The customer service representative used an emergency button to begin recording the conversation.
"FPL will get what they deserve, and it will be worse than 9/11," Sayoc then said, the records show. When the representative on the phone said he should not be making such threats, Sayoc responded that he doesn't make threats; he makes promises.
- Local
- Community
- Journalism
Support the independent voice of Miami and help keep the future of New Times free.
"At the end of the phone call, [Sayoc] stated that he was going to blow [the representative's] head off." The entire conversation was recorded and obtained by prosecutors.
The case was investigated by Florida Department of Law Enforcement agents and Miami police officers, who went to Sayoc's residence, where he admitted to making the threats.
The court docket in the case shows adjudication was withheld and Sayoc was given one year of probation. The closeout memo explaining the prosecutors' reasoning for withholding adjudication has been destroyed, which follows the State Attorney's Office's retention policies, so no more details are available at this time.
Keep Miami New Times Free... Since we started Miami New Times, it has been defined as the free, independent voice of Miami, and we would like to keep it that way. Offering our readers free access to incisive coverage of local news, food and culture. Producing stories on everything from political scandals to the hottest new bands, with gutsy reporting, stylish writing, and staffers who've won everything from the Society of Professional Journalists' Sigma Delta Chi feature-writing award to the Casey Medal for Meritorious Journalism. But with local journalism's existence under siege and advertising revenue setbacks having a larger impact, it is important now more than ever for us to rally support behind funding our local journalism. You can help by participating in our "I Support" membership program, allowing us to keep covering Miami with no paywalls.
