Medford Man Pleads Guilty to Sending Threats to Burn Black Churches, NAACP Offices

A Medford man admitted to threatening to burn down seven black churches and four NAACP headquarters in mailed letters, prosecutors said.

Jeffrey Smith, 46, pleaded guilty Thursday to 11 counts of making a threat to destroy a building by use of fire, and two counts of mailing threatening communication.

He could face up to 10 years in prison for each of the 11 counts and five years for each of the lesser charges.

Among the targets of the hateful, threatening letters were the Shiloh Baptist Church in West Medford, St. Paul Methodist Episcopal Church in Cambridge, and NAACP headquarters in Boston, Lawrence and Providence, R.I., according to a federal court indictment. The threats were sent between September and December of 2009, prosecutors said.

Smith lived at 122 Allston Street in Medford, according to court records.

In the letter sent to NAACP headquarters in Roxbury on Sept. 17, 2009, Smith wrote:

"I do not like African American or minorities in charge as supervisors of my security department at Novartis, nor I like them as President of the United States. For that I am going to burn down your offices just let you know how I feel. What right does some black person has the right to be in charge of me.”

Smith admitted to Federal Bureau of Investigation agents during an interview that he composed and mailed all the threatening letters to the churches and NAACP using the name of a Securitas supervisor with whom he did not get along, or whom he believed had unfairly taken employment action against a co-worker who is black, an FBI press release said.

Smith was arrested in April 2010 and indicted last June. He was initially granted bail, but it was revoked in August 2010 when the FBI learned he had been making threatening phone calls to one of the victims in the case, according to a previously sealed U.S. attorney court filing.

He faces up to 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine on each count of making a threat to destroy a building by use of fire, and five years in prison and up to a $250,000 fine on each of the count of mailing threatening communication.

He is scheduled to be sentenced July 14 in U.S. District Court in Boston.