splcenter.org

Edgar J. Steele, a self-described white separatist and “attorney for the politically incorrect,” was sentenced Wednesday to 50 years in federal prison for plotting the pipe bomb murder of his wife.

“This was a very serious offense,” U.S. District Judge B. Lynn Winmill said in sentencing the 66-year-old attorney who once represented the Aryan Nations and its founder Richard Butler.

Congress mandated a minimum of 40 years in prison for the type of crimes Steele was convicted of in May, the judge told a packed courtroom in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho.

Steele told the court it was a mistake that he didn’t act as his own lawyer or testify in his own defense on the advice of his retained attorney.

The sentence came after Steele spent 75 minutes in an angry, rambling oratory - likely his last courtroom appearance - where he maintained his innocence.  He claimed was targeted by corrupt federal agents, the Anti-Defamation League or the Russian Mafia.

“I have been held incommunicado by this government,” Steele told the judge. “I am a political prisoner being persecuted for my views.”

“The Constitution has been thrown out in my case, and you facilitated it judge - you!” Steele said, pointing at Winmill.

“There is no justice today for the politically incorrect,” Steele said in his continuing diatribe. “We are a government of elitist, self-righteous, ruthless men.”

“Why me?” Steele asked, suggesting he was “singled out” for prosecution in a conspiracy involving the federal government and the Anti-Defamation League. “We ought to turn the running of the government over to them (the ADL).  Oh, I forgot. We already did.”