A man from Lexington, Kentucky will face federal charges over allegations that he posted online comments threatening to murder police officers.
According to the Lexington Herald Leader, Google reported to the FBI this month that a YouTube user going by the name “Wyakee Douglas” was posting comments that led the platform to believe there was an “emergency involving imminent death or serious bodily injury to a person or persons.”
The FBI traced the comments to Wyakee Ansaran Vinegar, 48, who had written a slew of comments about hating white people and the police.
One of his comments, posted Oct. 4, reportedly said that “we going to have to start shooting and executing cops.”
In a comment on Sept. 29, he wrote “Boy I swear I’m at the point where I seriously hate white people. I wanna be a serial killer of cops.”
On Sept. 26, he wrote “white people are killing us so we need to start fearing for our lives and killing them.” His Twitter page was reportedly filled with violent rhetoric as well.
Vinegar was arrested and charged in the U.S. District Court in Lexington with threatening communications in interstate commerce.
“In my training and experience, many individuals who commit violent offenses, escalate their threatening behavior in the way Vinegar has,” FBI Special Agent Chelsea Holliday wrote in the affidavit. “His comments on Twitter in 2020 and 2021 showed a clear disdain for law enforcement and were threatening.”
“Furthermore, Vinegar’s more recent comments in September and October 2022, escalated to another level where Vinegar is explicitly calling for violence against, or death to, ‘white people’ and law enforcement officers, and stating he himself will ‘shoot’ or ‘kill’ them.”
In 2005, Vinegar was reportedly arrested for third-degree assault of a law enforcement officer.
This week, the New York Post reported that a man who previously threatened to kill police officers on his Twitter ended up going on a “wild crime spree.” Previously, he was charged with aggravated harassment. However, under the state’s criminal justice reforms, he was released. He then reportedly tried to steal a car and grabbed a cop by the throat and had to be hit with a taser when he was held at the police station.