A student at a New York college has been detained and appeared in court, facing accusations of making violent threats against Jewish students.
Patrick Dai, 21, is alleged to have threatened to bring a gun to Cornell University’s campus, commit acts of violence against Jewish women, and harm Jewish infants.
The engineering student, appearing in court in an orange jumpsuit, has been charged with making threats to kill or harm others using interstate communications, a crime that carries a maximum penalty of up to five years in prison.
During the court proceedings in Syracuse, New York, on Wednesday, Mr. Dai’s mother was present, and she appeared to make an effort to establish eye contact with her son. The prosecution, represented by Geoffrey Brown, requested that Mr. Dai be kept in custody, pointing out that he had visited a campus dining hall before allegedly posting threats about causing violence. Mr. Dai chose to forgo his right to a bail hearing.
The initial report on a series of antisemitic comments, which were posted on the Greekrank website, was first brought to public attention by The Cornell Daily Sun, the university’s newspaper. Greekrank, while not officially affiliated with the university, is a platform used by many of its students, primarily focusing on fraternity and sorority life across various campuses.
One post from the commenter named “hamas” was titled “if i see another jew”.
Mr Dai’s parents told the New York Post that their son suffers from “severe depression”.
“He cannot control his emotion well due to the depression,” Mr Dai’s father, who asked not to be named, told the newspaper in a text message.
“No, I don’t think he committed the crime. He told us he lost his life goal and motivation. As parents, we tried to give him more love.”
Mr Dai’s father said he and his wife lost communication with their son in the days before his arrest.
They had attempted to contact him, he said, worried he might commit suicide.
In a statement, Cornell University said: “We remain shocked by and condemn these horrific, antisemitic threats and believe they should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.”
The university said that police will maintain a heightened security presence on campus in the coming days.
Molly Goldstein, co-president of the Cornell Center for Jewish Living, told CNN: “Jewish students on campus right now are unbelievably terrified for their lives.”
The threats against Cornell’s Jewish community came amid reports of rising antisemitic incidents around the country.
Speaking to a congressional committee on Tuesday, FBI Director Christopher Wray told lawmakers that antisemitic abuse was reaching “historic levels” in the US.
“Our statistics would indicate that for a group that represents only about 2.4% of the American public, they account for something like 60% of all religious-based hate crimes,” Mr Wray said of Jewish Americans.
He noted that this figure had probably risen since the Israel-Gaza conflict erupted on 7 October.