A longtime Madison protester and one-time candidate for the US House who most recently was living in Portland, Oregon, pleaded guilty Monday to three misdemeanors in connection with threats he made against former Dane County Sheriff Dave Mahoney and his family in 2020.
Jeremy Ryan, 33, was sentenced to 90 days in jail for disorderly conduct, sending a threatening message by computer and unlawful use of a telephone, but the sentence was considered served because of time he had spent in the Dane County Jail after his arrest. One felony charge, for stalking, was dismissed as part of the agreement. He had originally been charged with felony stalking and making terrorist threats, but only the stalking charge was included in an updated criminal complaint filed Monday.
Ryan
DANE COUNTY SHERIFF’S OFFICE
The Dane County case was prosecuted in Rock County by the Milwaukee County District Attorney’s office avoiding any conflicts of interest.
Ryan on June 24, 2020, threatened to release personal information on Mahoney and his family unless an inmate in the Dane County Jail was moved from segregation, according to a criminal complaint filed two days later. Ryan later alleged on Facebook that Mahoney abused the use of segregation at the jail.
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He also called on hundreds of protesters to harass Mahoney’s family home, the original complaint states, and sent text and Facebook messages to Mahoney in addition to calling his work, cell and home phones. According to the complaint, he posted on Facebook a message directed at Mahoney that read: “But you’ve left me no choice and I’m a man of my word. … Tick Tick Tick … Kaboom … Doxx target hit!!! Sincerely , your favorite nuclear terrorist!”
In a victim impact statement filed with the court Monday, Mahoney, who retired from the sheriff’s office in May, said that as a public official, he always knew he could be subject to threats from people who disagreed with him.
“However, when someone threatens your family, that is a different situation,” he wrote. In order to calm his family’s fears, police were stationed for a time outside their homes, he said, and he called for Ryan to get prison time.
Ryan was known as “Segway Jeremy” for often using a Segway scooter around the Capitol Square during mass protests in 2011 against an ultimately successful bid by Republicans to significantly curtail public union rights. In 2018, he finished fifth in a six-way Republican primary to replace then-US Rep. Paul Ryan.
He was later arrested for mail-ordering what he believed was radioactive material from an undercover FBI agent. Prosecutors alleged Ryan had planned to use it to kill someone, while he said he intended to use the polonium-210 to commit suicide. He pleaded guilty in the case in January 2020 and was placed on supervision, with six months to be served in a halfway house.
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