Prosecutors Want ‘Sext’ Freak Anthony Weiner Behind Bars For 2 Years
Image by getty images
U.S. prosecutors on Wednesday sought a prison sentence of 21 to 27 months for former Congressman Anthony Weiner, who admitted to sending sexually explicit messages to a teenage girl in a “sexting” scandal that played a role in last year’s U.S. presidential election.
“Weiner, a grown man, a father, and a former lawmaker, willfully and knowingly asked a 15-year-old girl to display her body and engage in sexually explicit conduct for him online,” prosecutors said in a filing in Manhattan federal court. “Such conduct warrants a meaningful sentence of incarceration.”
A lawyer for Weiner, who is scheduled to be sentenced by U.S. District Judge Denise Cote next Monday, could not immediately be reached for comment.
In a court filing last week, Weiner’s lawyers asked that he be sentenced to probation with no prison time, saying he acted out of the “depths of an uncontrolled sickness” for which he was now being treated.
Weiner, 53, pleaded guilty in May to transferring obscene material to a minor.
The investigation into Weiner’s exchanges with the teenage girl roiled the 2016 U.S. presidential campaign in its final days, when authorities found emails on Weiner’s laptop from his wife Huma Abedin, an aid to Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. Abedin has filed for divorce.
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning journalism this Passover.
In this age of misinformation, our work is needed like never before. We report on the news that matters most to American Jews, driven by truth, not ideology.
At a time when newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall. That means for the first time in our 126-year history, Forward journalism is free to everyone, everywhere. With an ongoing war, rising antisemitism, and a flood of disinformation that may affect the upcoming election, we believe that free and open access to Jewish journalism is imperative.
Readers like you make it all possible. Right now, we’re in the middle of our Passover Pledge Drive and we still need 300 people to step up and make a gift to sustain our trustworthy, independent journalism.
Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Only 300 more gifts needed by April 30
