Man Accused of Racist Threats Expected to Plead Guilty

A white man charged with making racist online threats against a black activist in Virginia is expected to plead guilty on Thursday, according to court records and a spokesman for federal prosecutors.

Brian McGinn, spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's office for the Western District of Virginia, said Daniel McMahon was expected to enter a guilty plea during a hearing originally set for March 16. But a judge postponed the change-of-plea hearing due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Thursday's hearing is expected to be conducted by video conference.

McMahon, of Brandon, Florida, pleaded not guilty to charges including bias-motivated interference with a candidate for elective office. He had a trial scheduled to start June 15 at the federal courthouse in Charlottesville, Virginia.

McMahon was charged last August with posting social media messages intended to intimidate activist Don Gathers and interfere with Gathers' plans to run for a seat on Charlottesville's city council. An indictment says McMahon, who was 31 at the time of his arrest, expressed white supremacist views on his social media accounts.

During a hearing last year in Tampa, Florida, U.S. Magistrate Judge Thomas Wilson concluded McMahon posed a danger to the community and ordered him detained without bail. The judge cited McMahon's apparent mental instability, access to firearms and social media posts in which he celebrated hate-fueled mass shootings in Pittsburgh and Charleston, South Carolina.

McMahon's mother told investigators that her son didn't like blacks, Jews or gay people and exhibited some of the same characteristics of mass shooters, testified Siobhan Maseda, a Pasco County Sheriff's Office detective.

Others have accused McMahon of bombarding them with hateful, threatening messages through online aliases, including "Jack Corbin."