Yahoo! User Appeals Conviction for Obama Threat

The Yahoo! Finance user who was convicted of making a death threat in 2008 against then-presidential candidate Barack Obama, has filed an appeal that claims his postings on a message board did not constitute a "true threat."

San Diego CityBeat is reporting that Walter Bagdasarian of La Mesa, Calif. has filed a brief arguing that his statements were "vague, merely predictive and made while he was drunk," and could not be construed as a serious threat to Obama. Bagdasarian, however, does admit they were racist.

CityBeat also asks why, if Bagdasarian was so dangerous, it took US Secret Service personnel more than a month to track him down through his IP address.

On Oct. 22, 2008, Bagdasarian made two posts on Yahoo! Finance's AIG page:

Shoot the nig. Country fkd for another 4 years+, what nig has done ANYTHING right???? Long term???? Never in history, except sambos.

and

FK the niggar, he will have a 50 cal in the head soon.

For more details on the appeal and the procedures the Secret Service used to track down Bagdasarian, read CityBeat's Last Blog On Earth.