A Canadian citizen who was kicked out of a gay bar in New York City has been charged with mailing fake anthrax to the establishment after employees threatened to ban him.
Ameen Keshvajee, 57, faces federal charges of sending a threat through the mail and conveying a hoax. If convicted of both charges, he could face up to 10 years in prison.
According to a press release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York, Keshvajee, a regular patron of Nowhere bar, a gay bar in Manhattan’s East Village neighborhood, began sending email messages to an employee at the bar.
In February 2019, the employee informed Keshvajee if he kept sending him messages at his private account, he would be banned from the bar.
Keshvajee stopped coming to the bar, but began sending threatening emails to the employee, even indicating that he wished for the employee’s death.
According to the New York Daily News, one email, dated Feb. 25, Keshvajee allegedly wrote: “DIE OF AIDS, you leftie, hypocrite, democrat-voting FUCKS!!!!! I sincerely hope [the employee’s partner] gives it to you, you fucking disgrace to the planet! I will be there to pee on your individual coffins!”
Two days later, he then allegedly wrote an email stating: “I miss my little spot. You fuck.”
On Dec. 9, 2019, Keshvajee allegedly mailed an envelope to the bar addressed to the employee in question. The envelope included a white powdery substance and bore the message: “It’s called anthrax. Enjoy.”
Upon opening the envelope, the employee called 911. Officers responded to the scene, secured the area, and confiscated the envelope and the letter. The City of New York Department of Health and Mental Hygiene Public Health Laboratory later concluded that the materials did not contain anthrax.
Postal Service investigators were able to connect Keshvajee to the threat by confirming he’d used his credit card to buy the stamp on the envelope, prosecutors say.
U.S. Attorney Geoffrey S. Berman said that Keshvajee’s arrest “makes clear that we will not tolerate anthrax threats” and that Keshvajee would have to pay for his alleged “threatening actions.”
“Even though there was no actual anthrax in the note allegedly mailed by Keshavjee, that doesn’t minimize the consequences of the crime,” FBI Assistant Director William Sweeney, Jr., said in a statement. “Hoax threats not only intimidate the victims they are intended for, they require extensive law enforcement resources that could be better used elsewhere. For anyone out there who might be contemplating a hoax of this nature, just remember Keshavjee now faces up to 10 years in prison for his alleged actions.”
Keshvajee has since been released on $20,000 bail and been ordered to stay away from the bar or have contact with any of its employees as he awaits trial. He has thus far declined to comment publicly on the charges against him.
Rapper and record producer Sean "Diddy" Combs has been hit with six new lawsuits filed against him in federal court, including four in which the plaintiffs are men, claiming the music mogul sexually assaulted them.
The assaults are alleged to have taken place at industry events, "exclusive" after-parties, and Combs' famous "White Parties" in the Hamptons between 1995 and 2021. The latest suits bring the total number of sexual assault accusations against Combs to 18, reports The New York Times.
Two of the men have accused Combs of assaulting them at his star-studded White Party. One victim, who was 16 at the time of the alleged assault in 1998, claims Combs told him to drop his pants and proceeded to fondle his genitals. Combs allegedly told the boy, who was trying to break into the music industry, that the assault was a "rite of passage."
The St. Patrick's Day parade on Staten Island has finally broken a 60-year ban and will allow LGBTQ groups to march in the annual event.
Organizers have invited the Pride Center of Staten Island, a local community nonprofit, to march in the upcoming celebration on March 2, 2025.
The invitation was extended to the Pride Center -- which had battled with past leadership over the exclusion of LGBTQ groups -- following a change in leadership within the Richmond County St. Patrick’s Day Parade Committee, which organizes the parade.
"The parade committee is entrusted with ensuring the focus of the parade remains upon Saint Patrick, the history, traditions, culture, and faith of the Irish people," the committee said in a statement. "In this endeavor, the leadership of The Pride Center has assured the parade committee that they are ready to provide support to the parade in fulfilling this obligation."
An anonymous homophobe sent a vicious, threatening email to the wife of WNBA superstar and three-time Olympic gold medalist Breanna Stewart.
According to the New York Post, Stewart's wife, Marta Xargay Casademont, walked into the New York Police Department's 78th Precinct, in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn, on October 10 to inform police of the menacing email.
"I hope someone shoots your wife dead, fuck you dykes, I hope you both die," the email allegedly read, in part. It reportedly contained other heinous statements and threats.
According to the Post, a memo by NBA security said the email was sent from an Internet address that has been associated with other hateful emails, including death threats, bomb threats, and racist rhetoric.
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