PARKERSBURG, W.Va. — A Wood County man who threatened last fall to seize control of state government was sentenced to 2-8 years in prison Thursday in Wood County Circuit Court.
Thomas David Deegan, 39, of Mineral Wells, was sentenced to consecutive terms following convictions of making a terroristic threat and violating home confinement. Wood County Circuit Judge Jeff Reed ordered the sentences, making a terroristic threat 1-3 years and violation of home confinement 1-5 years, run concurrently.
Deegan was convicted on the terroristic threat charge by a 12-member Wood County jury last month. The prosecution’s case centered on a conference call recorded last September where Deegan talked about his plan to travel to Charleston and take over the state capitol. He tried to argue Thursday what he said was a “slip of the tongue,” Wood County Prosecutor Jason Wharton said.
“The court rejected that argument and actually pointed out some of the specific statements from the call,” Wharton said.
Deegan told those on the line to reference Google Earth to find out where police and military installations were in relation to the capitol. He also called on those joining him to be armed, Wharton said.
“It was a statement in regards to, ‘If the police arrive you should shoot them,'” Wharton said.
Whether or not Deegan intended to carry out the threat wasn’t something the prosecution had to consider because the charge has to do with communicating the threat, according to Wharton.
“There were so many people involved in this phone call that there was substantial danger of others following through on the plans that were being put forth regardless of what Mr. Deegan’s intentions may or may not have been,” Wharton said.
Deegan argued during his trial the call in question was one of 12 calls and his comments were taken out of context.
The calls focused on a plot to remove “multiple West Virginia government leaders from their office in Charleston,” investigators said.
Those individuals named included Governor Earl Ray Tomblin and state Adjutant General James Hoyer.
Plans called for members of the sovereign citizen movement, made up of people with antigovernment views, to take over West Virginia’s government on Sept. 24, 2015 and use it as a foothold for the sovereign movement to “take back the United States,” according to the original criminal complaint.
Deegan also denied being a sovereign citizen during the trial, instead calling himself a man of God.
“I don’t have anything to do with people my age,” Deegan said.