By Nate Raymond
Nov 3 (Reuters) – A man who was pardoned by President Donald Trump after pleading guilty to a charge related to the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol has been arrested and charged with threatening judges who presided over cases concerning the riot.
Cleveland Meredith, 58, was charged in a criminal complaint filed in federal court in Atlanta, and made public on Monday, with making a threat to execute judges who presided over January 6-related cases.
“ALL J6 Federal JUDGES will be EXECUTED!” Meredith wrote in a post on Facebook in April, according to the complaint.
In seeking Meredith’s detention, prosecutors said in a filing that the resident of Sautee Nacoochee, Georgia, had in recent weeks “posted several threatening and concerning messages calling for violence following the midterm elections,” which were underway in the US on Tuesday.
“Make damn sure that you’re on the right team going into the midterms…firing squads will commence on Wednesday, 11/04/26,” Meredith wrote in one post on October 6, according to prosecutors.
His court-appointed lawyer did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Tuesday.
Meredith was among the more than 1,500 people charged with offenses related to the January 6 attack, a failed attempt to stop the congressional certification of Democrat Joe Biden’s 2020 presidential election victory, who were later pardoned by Trump when he returned to office in January 2025.
Meredith had on the evening of January 6 driven to Washington, DC, with a pistol, a rifle, 2,500 rounds of ammunition and 10 large-capacity ammunition feeding devices, according to charging papers.
While there, he texted a relative that he planned to “put a bullet” in the head of Nancy Pelosi, then the Democratic speaker of the US House of Representatives, authorities alleged.
He pleaded guilty in 2021 to making interstate threats and was sentenced by US District Judge Amy Berman Jackson to 28 months in prison.
(Reporting by Nate Raymond in Boston; Editing by Jonathan Spicer )
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