Cornell University student arrested after threatening to shoot Jewish students on campus

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Patrick Dai, a 21-year-old Cornell University junior, was arrested for making antisemitic threats.
Dai posted online that he’d “bring an assault rifle to campus and shoot all you pig jews.” 
His Tuesday arrest comes after the threats prompted days of campus-wide alert and distress among Jewish students.

Patrick Dai, a 21-year-old Cornell University junior, was arrested Tuesday and charged with posting death threats after prosecutors alleged he made antisemitic threats against his college peers that had the entire campus on alert throughout the weekend.

In a statement released by the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Northern District of New York, prosecutors allege Dai was behind a series of threatening online posts targeting Jewish students at Cornell, including calling for the deaths of Jewish people and a threat that said “gonna shoot up 104 west,” the home of the Center for Jewish Living.

“In another post, Dai allegedly threatened to ‘stab’ and ‘slit the throat’ of any Jewish males he sees on campus, to rape and throw off a cliff any Jewish females, and to behead any Jewish babies,” prosecutors alleged in the statement. “In that same post, Dai threatened to ‘bring an assault rifle to campus and shoot all you pig jews.'”

The charge filed against Dai, posting threats to kill or injure another using interstate communications, carries a maximum potential term of up to 5 years in prison, as well as a fine of up to $250,000, and a term of supervised release of up to 3 years. 

Dai is expected to make his initial appearance tomorrow in federal court in Syracuse, New York.

The arrest comes as Cornell’s campus was on high alert over the weekend, with some Jewish students opting to leave campus over the threats of danger, while others made plans to sue the elite school for not doing enough to stop the “explosion” of antisemitism on campus.