No Bail for Batty Blogger

Of the infinite number of messages that can be conveyed through a blog, threatening the lives of three Chicago-based federal judges might not be the wisest. MSNBC.com reported that 47-year-old Hal Turner of North Bergen, N.J., was denied bail for doing just that.

According to MSNBC.com, attorneys offered to release Turner if he agreed to home confinement, minus use of the Internet, but U.S. Magistrate Michael Shipp said he considered Turner a danger to the community and ordered him transferred to Illinois.

Turner allegedly posted statements on his Web site calling for the murder of three federal appeals court judges in Chicago (Richard Posner, Frank Easterbrook and William Bauer) who recently upheld bans on handguns in Chicago and a suburb, MSNBC.com reported. The FBI said Turner’s posts included the judges’ pictures, phone numbers, work address and room numbers; a picture and map of the courthouse where they try cases; and the statement, “Let me be the first to say this plainly: these Judges deserve to be killed.”

Turner apparently doesn’t confine his hate to one state: MSNBC.com also reported that he was arraigned in a Connecticut court Monday on a charge of encouraging violence against state legislators there for allegedly telling readers of his blog to “take up arms” against the lawmakers, adding that government officials should “obey the Constitution or die.”

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