While some Jan. 6 protesters who entered the U.S. Capitol in 2021 continue to languish in jail, a 20-year-old in Minneapolis who tried to burn down a high school during a Black Lives Matter riot was sentenced to five years’ probation on Feb. 3.
Mohamed Hussein Abdi was arrested in June 2020 after walking into the school amid rioting and setting fire to a trash bin. Security camera footage shows him pouring liquid into the can and fleeing as smoke began to accumulate.
Abdi pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit arson and was sentenced pursuant to the Sentencing Reform Act of 1984, according to court documents reviewed by Fox News. The federal statute “permits an individual to be sentenced to a term of imprisonment or probation and a fine, and to receive additional sanctions.”
The rioter was, however, also hit with a fine totaling close to $34,000. It is to be paid to the high school where Abdi set the fire — Gordon Parks High School in St. Paul. The school was damaged, according to a complaint filed in conjunction with Abdi’s charging in 2020. Abdi conspired with another person and also threw rocks at police, the Star Tribune reported.
Abdi is not the only Minneapolis rioter who is getting a break. As reported by The Daily Wire, Montez Terriel Lee, 26, escaped a murder charge. Lee burned down a pawn shop during the George Floyd riots, resulting in the death of 30-year-old Oscar Lee Stewart. The U.S. Department of Justice relied on The Hennepin County Medical Examiner’s Office — which said Stewart’s death was because of “probable inhalation of products of combustion and thermal injury (building fire),” and Lee was sentenced to 10 years in prison for arson.
Minneapolis was hit hard during the media-inflamed 2020 “racial injustice” riots. A report shortly after the city was racked with violence tallied some 700 buildings damaged. Erik Hansen, the city’s director of policy and economic development, said “disproportionally impacted neighborhoods” struggling economically suffered the most damage.
