Floyd Lee Corkins II, the man who opened fire at the Family Research Council (FRC) headquarters in August 2012, has pleaded guilty to three felony charges–including a terrorism offense.
According to a press statement from the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), “Corkins … pled guilty in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia to charges of committing an act of terrorism while armed, assault with intent to kill while armed, and interstate transportation of a firearm and ammunition.” He will be sentenced on April 29.
This is the first time anyone has been convicted of a committing an act of terrorism with “intent to ‘intimidate or coerce a significant portion of the civilian population of the District of Columbia or the United States.'”
The DOJ also reports that Corkins specifically targeted FRC in his attack, consulting a Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) list of organizations that oppose homosexuality. The SPLC connection was first raised by FRC president Tony Perkins less than a week after the attack.
Perkins voiced a similar sentiment in a statement Wednesday:
The Southern Poverty Law Center can no longer say that it is not a source for those bent on committing acts of violence. Only by ending its hate labeling practices will the SPLC send a message that it no longer wishes to be a source for those who would commit acts of violence that are only designed to intimidate and silence Christians and others who support natural marriage and traditional morality.
Once again, I call on the SPLC to put an immediate stop to its practice of labeling organizations that oppose their promotion of homosexuality.
CT previously reported news of the shooting after it occurred, then weighed in on the debate surrounding Perkins’ “caustic rhetoric” in an editorial.
