Adam Fox, a militia member who plotted to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, was sentenced to 16 years in prison on Tuesday, The Associated Press reported.
After Fox’s first trial ended in a hung jury, he was found guilty in August of kidnapping conspiracy and conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction.
He faced life in prison.
This file image provided by the Kent County Jail in Mich. shows Adam Fox.
Kent County Jail via AP, File
Fox and another convicted militia member, Barry Croft Jr., “intended to kidnap Governor Whitmer from her vacation cottage near Elk Rapids, Michigan” in 2020 and use “destructive devices to facilitate their plot by harming and hindering the governor’s security detail and any responding law enforcement officers,” according to the Department of Justice.
Prosecutors said the men’s goal was to ignite a civil war.
Fourteen people were arrested in the kidnapping plot, according to the AP. Fox and Croft were accused of the most serious charges.
Fox was the “driving force urging their recruits to take up arms, kidnap the governor and kill those who stood in their way,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Nils Kessler said in a court filing, according to the AP.
Croft is set to be sentenced on Wednesday.