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New sentence ordered in bomb plot case

MILWAUKEE — A Wisconsin man who "wanted to be the next (Timothy) McVeigh" by blowing up a federal building in downtown Milwaukee must be resentenced, an appeals court ruled Thursday.

Steven Parr, 43, of Janesville was sentenced to 10 years in prison after he was convicted by a jury in April 2006 of plotting to blow up the Reuss Federal Plaza.

U.S. District Judge William Griesbach sentenced Parr to a term well below the federal guidelines, which called for 30 years to life in prison. He noted Parr's threat was "not calculated to influence or affect the conduct of government" because it was uttered to his cellmate, the appeals court said.

Parr appealed the conviction and the sentence. The government too appealed, saying the sentence should have been longer.

The appeals court didn't say if Griesbach's term was too light or too stiff, according to a 28-page decision authored by Judge Diane Sykes, of Wisconsin. Rather, the court found that Griesbach incorrectly ruled that Parr's crime "involved" a federal crime of terrorism, giving him a 12-point enhancement under the sentencing guidelines.

Sykes wrote that Griesbach erred in how he applied the word "include." But Parr's crime still might warrant the enhancement if Griesbach finds on resentencing that Parr's crime "promoted" an act of terrorism, Sykes wrote.

In 2004, while in Oshkosh Correctional Institution on drug charges, Parr told a cellmate that he planned to blow up the federal building, court records show. The cellmate, who called the FBI, later secretly taped Parr, who said the Reuss building would be a good target because of its glass exterior, according to tapes played in court.

Witnesses for the prosecution included Parr's former girlfriends, who testified that he had made pipe bombs and talked about idolizing McVeigh and the Unabomber, Theodore Kaczynski.

Parr argued his statements were protected by the First Amendment, but the appeals court ruled that doesn't apply to threats.

The court rejected Parr's claim the jury shouldn't have been able to hear about his bomb-making background, but it said Griesbach should not have allowed the jury to see an entire copy of "The Anarchist Cookbook" during deliberations. However, the court found that was a harmless error.