Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Fast Forward

Man Conspiring To Behead Pamela Geller Sentenced To 28 Years

A man inspired by ISIS who had conspired to behead a Jewish anti-Muslim blogger and activist was sentenced Tuesday to 28 years in prison, the New York Daily News reported.

David Wright, 28, was found guilty of plotting with his uncle and another man. Prosecutors said that Wright sought to emulate ISIS’ infamous beheadings.

Wright, who was over 500 pounds at the sentencing hearing, said he never actually followed ISIS, and just promoted the group online to get attention. He called it “trash talk.”

The beheading plot came about after Geller created a cartoon contest for depicting the prophet Mohammed. Images of prophets are forbidden by Islamic law.

Speaking at the sentencing hearing, Geller said that the threat had been “devastating” to her, and caused her to spend thousands of dollars on security.

“There is no assurance that anyone can give me that he would not resume his quest to kill me and my relatives,” she said.

Contact Ari Feldman at [email protected] or on Twitter @aefeldman

A message from our Publisher & CEO Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.

If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

With your support, we’ll be ready for whatever 2025 brings.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.