JACKSON, Tenn. — A white supremacist has been sentenced to 10 years in prison for conspiring to kill then-presidential candidate Barack Obama and dozens of other black people.
U.S. District Judge J. Daniel Breen on Thursday sentenced 19-year-old Paul Schlesselman of Helena-West Helena, Ark. He had pleaded guilty in January.
Twenty-one-year-old co-defendant, Daniel Cowart of Bells, Tenn., also pleaded guilty and is awaiting sentencing.
Authorities have described the pair as white supremacist skinheads who hatched a plan to go on a cross-country robbery and killing spree that would end with an attack on Obama in 2008.
Their plan was to kill 88 African-Americans and behead 14 others before trying to take out Obama. The numbers 88 and 14 are symbolic in the white supremacist movement.
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