You are reading

Queens Man Who Fantasized About a Mass-Shooting Gets 57 Months in Jail for Weapons Charge

(iStock)

July 14, 2021 By Michael Dorgan

A Bayside man who glorified an attack against Jews and fantasized about a mass shooting has been sentenced to nearly five years in prison for buying an illegally defaced firearm.

Joseph Miner, 31, was sentenced in Brooklyn federal court Tuesday to 57 months in prison for purchasing a Glock 9mm handgun with a scraped-off serial number, prosecutors said.

Miner was caught trying to buy the weapon from an undercover FBI agent posing as a gun dealer at a Queens hotel near LaGuardia Airport in May 2020. Daniel Jou, his neighbor, was also busted in the sting.

Law enforcement began tracking Miner in late 2019 after he took to social media in an attempt to get weapons for a “racial holy war,” prosecutors said.

Federal officials said Miner posted several social media messages where he fantasized about becoming a martyr and described how he would “go out in a blaze of glory” in a mass shooting attack.

Prosecutors added that, on occasions, Miner disavowed interest in conducting an attack by himself.

Nevertheless, Miner had a history of posting racist and anti-Semitic messages and allegedly celebrated a number of hate crimes that had made headlines, prosecutors said.

For example, he described a 2019 machete attack at a synagogue in Monsey, NY, as exciting and expressed praise for the 2017 white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virg. on social media, according to authorities.

Other posts included a photograph of Miner giving a Nazi salute and another of a Planned Parenthood facility being blown up by the comic book character the Joker, prosecutors said.

“Tbh [to be honest] dying fighting Paki and African pieces of shit in Europe wouldn’t be the worst way to go. Die a hero,” he wrote, according to prosecutors.

Miner pleaded guilty to the firearm charge in January. He had also purchased an AR-15-style ghost gun and a Mossberg 500 shotgun off the undercover agent but charges for those weapons were dropped as part of his plea agreement, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

Acting U.S. Attorney Jacquelyn Kasulis said that illegal guns pose a serious threat to the safety of the community.

“Today’s sentence holds Miner accountable for his knowing purchase of a firearm that could not be traced because its serial number had been removed,” Kasulis said.

  1. Meanwhile, Jou, his neighborhood, is scheduled to appear in federal court on Aug. 31 to face charges. He is expected to plead guilty.
email the author: [email protected]
No comments yet

Leave a Comment
Reply to this Comment

All comments are subject to moderation before being posted.


The reCAPTCHA verification period has expired. Please reload the page.

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Recent News

Long Island man charged in fatal Flushing hit-and-run that left 81-year-old man dead: NYPD

A Long Island truck driver was arrested on Tuesday and booked at the 109th Precinct in Flushing for a fatal hit-and-run collision that killed a Murray Hill senior who was riding an electric bike on Northern Boulevard three months ago.

Kyle Schreiber, 27, of Lincoln Boulevard in Hauppauge, was charged with leaving the scene of an accident resulting in the death of 81-year-old Peter Seo on the morning of Thursday, Dec. 28.

MTA seizes 19 ‘ghost’ cars registered to toll violators at Queens Midtown Tunnel on Monday

Two days before the MTA Board approved the controversial congestion pricing plan for Manhattan on Wednesday, the agency cracked down on persistent toll violators at the Queens Midtown Tunnel in Long Island City.

MTA Bridges and Tunnels seized 19 vehicles registered to persistent scofflaws on Monday and issued 81 summonses and confiscated two fraudulent incense plates. The MTA noted that the scofflaws accounted for approximately $483,000 in combined unpaid tolls and fees. One of the top persistent toll violators from the targeted enforcement owed nearly $76,000 in tolls and fees.