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Man Who Threatened StemExpress Sentenced to One Year in Prison

A federal judge sentenced Scott Anthony Orton to a year and a day in prison for threatening a biotech firm's founder and employees for doing business with Planned Parenthood.

Scott Anthony Orton posted 19 messages on the FoxNation website, including “Kill StemExpress employees. I’ll pay you for it,” and, “Stop the death of innocents. Kill the killers,” and, “I think I’ll take a little trip to Placerville this weekend. I hear there’s some good hunting down Placerville way.” Shutterstock

A federal judge in California on Tuesday sentenced Scott Anthony Orton to a year and a day in federal prison for threatening the founder and employees of StemExpress, a biotech firm implicated in anti-choice activist David Daleiden’s video campaign alleging that Planned Parenthood affiliates had illegally profited from the donation of fetal tissue.

As reported by the Sacramento Bee, in 2015, Orton posted an video of himself on YouTube angrily ranting about the release by Daleiden of discredited, surreptitiously recorded videos linking StemExpress to Planned Parenthood affiliates’ allegedly unlawful fetal tissue donation practices. Two days after the release of that video, Orton then posted the following message on the FoxNation website: “The management of StemExpress should be taken by force and killed in the streets today.”

Court records show that Orton posted 18 more messages on the FoxNation website, such as “Kill StemExpress employees. I’ll pay you for it,” and, “Stop the death of innocents. Kill the killers,” and, “I think I’ll take a little trip to Placerville this weekend. I hear there’s some good hunting down Placerville way.”

Federal law enforcement officers traced those online threats to Orton, who was arrested in December. In April, he pleaded guilty to transmitting interstate threats.

As far as the claims against Planned Parenthood and StemExpress that inspired Orton’s threats, dozens of state and federal investigations have found no evidence that the reproductive health-care provider was unlawfully trafficking in fetal tissue.