Sentencing for bridge bomb plotter delayed

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AKRON, Ohio, Nov. 21 (UPI) -- A federal judge Wednesday delayed sentencing for a fourth defendant in an Ohio bridge bomb plot who wants less prison time than his co-defendants.

Anthony Hayne, 36, of Cleveland was to have been sentenced in U.S. District Court in Akron, but Judge David Dowd Jr. postponed his decision until Nov. 30 after Hayne's attorney filed a motion late Tuesday seeking to withdraw his client's guilty plea if he doesn't get substantially less prison time that three other defendants, The (Cleveland) Plain Dealer reported.

Defense attorney Michael O'Shea said in the court filing he hopes Hayne receives about half the eight years given Tuesday to Connor Stevens of Berea.

O'Shea said Hayne should be given a break since he has cooperated extensively with authorities and was a late recruit to the bomb plot.

Douglas Wright of Indianapolis was given an 11 1/2-year term and Brandon Baxter, 21, of Lakewood got nearly 10 years.

Federal prosecutors had wanted much harsher sentences.

The mental competency of a fifth suspect, Joshua Stafford, remains in question.

The members of the group were arrested April 30 after an undercover FBI investigation found they planned to use C-4 explosives blow up a bridge on Interstate 80 that carries fours lanes of traffic over Cuyahoga Valley National Park outside Cleveland.

Hayne has testified they intended to bomb the bridge "to stop the transportation of the 1 percent," a term used by the Occupy movement to refer to the richest people in the United States. The defendants had met through the populist movement in Cleveland.