LI man charged in threats to SEC, officials

A Long Island businessman was arrested on charges of threatening to kill 47 officials of federal and private financial regulatory agencies - including the current and former chairmen of the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Vincent P. McCrudden, 49, was ordered held without bail Friday as a "clear danger" to the community. He stood in blue jeans before U.S. Magistrate E. Thomas Boyle in federal court in Central Islip, the day after FBI agents took him into custody when he arrived at Newark Liberty Airport on a jet from Singapore.

His attorney, Bruce Barket of Garden City, said McCrudden had meant no one any harm.

Boyle, referring to several threatening e-mails McCrudden allegedly sent, pointedly asked the defense attorney, "That is the defense in this case?"

The magistrate noted authorities' allegations that McCrudden, in addition to sending death threats, sent out requests on the Internet for regulatory officials' phone numbers, home addresses and other personal information.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Christopher Caffarone said McCrudden, who lived in Long Beach before his recent monthlong stay in Singapore, has had a history of issuing death threats against people involved in the financial industry. After one earlier incident, McCrudden spent 19 months in a diversionary program and received counseling.

The magistrate, indicating concern about McCrudden's competence, asked Barket if he wanted a psychiatric evaluation of his client. Barket declined, citing his decade-long acquaintance with McCrudden.

If convicted in connection with the alleged threats to kill or injure financial regulators, McCrudden faces up to 10 years in prison.

The arrest - less than a week after the shootings in Tucson, Ariz., that killed six people, including a federal judge, and injured Democratic Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and 12 others - stirred concern at the federal government's top levels.

"The Department of Justice takes very seriously the allegations in the complaint against Mr. McCrudden that was unsealed today," Lanny Breuer, the head of the U.S. Justice Department's criminal division, said in a statement. "Threats of death and violence against federal officials and employees for executing their duties are simply unacceptable."

Loretta Lynch, U.S. attorney for the Eastern District, said, "In this day and age, there is no such thing as an idle threat."

McCrudden was named in a civil suit filed in December by the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission that accused him of operating unregistered commodity investment pools, according to a federal complaint filed in the case. Also named in the suit were two companies based in Dix Hills that McCrudden operated - Managed Accounts Asset Management and Alnbri Management, the federal complaint says.

That civil suit set off the torrent of threats from McCrudden that were posted on websites or e-mailed, the complaint says, naming among them a posting on Alnbri's website that included the title "Execution List" and named 47 current or past financial officials.

The posting read, "These people have got to go! And I need your help, there are just too many for me alone," the complaint says.

Another posting on that website contained in the federal complaint read, "Go buy a gun, and lets (sic) get to work in taking back our country from these criminals. I will be the first one to lead by example."

Outside court, Barket said his client was angry but never intended to carry out any of the threats.

"I've known him for 10 years. He can be short-tempered and ill-mannered, but he's not very good at using metaphors, similes or allegories," the defense attorney said. "He doesn't possess any weapons."