School Shooting Stopped, Exchange Student Who Made Threat To Be Deported
An 18-year-old foreign exchange student who pleaded guilty to firearm and terroristic threat charges will be deported and permanently barred from entering the United States of America.
An-Tso Sun was arrested in March after threatening to attack Monsignor Bonner and Archbishop Prendergast High School. On Monday a federal Judge sentenced him to deportation, also ruling his potentially lengthy prison sentence as time served, according to the Associated Press.
Although Sun claimed the talk was only a joke, his host family’s house was brimming with ammunition and weapons. Authorities also found his school iPad had been used to search for ways to buy an AR-15 or AK-47.
Police also discovered ballistic body armor at the home.
An Tso Sun, 18, arrested for threatening to shoot up local high school. Sun was found to have a military vest and ammunition at his residence. Kudos to the person who stepped forward and helped to avert a tragedy. pic.twitter.com/hRV1ec6TRl
— Upper Darby Police (@UDPolice) March 28, 2018
Robert Keller, Sun’s lawyer, said the family felt “they were dealt with very fairly by the U.S. They’re relieved and very emotional still.”
“I think the judge was right on when she indicated that she was dealing with a young man who didn’t appreciate that words matter,” Keller said. “He is paying a dear and appropriate price and it was a lesson learned.”
Originally facing a sentence of up to 10 years and a six-figure fine, this foreign exchange student was lucky to be placed in front of such a lenient and understanding judge.
Assistant United States Attorney Sarah Wolfe commented that the federal judge “considered a number of factors, the fact that he was very young, and very immature, was not from this country and did not appreciate the seriousness of the threat he made.”
Sun once hoped to attend Temple University, but his plea agreement is landing him on the other side of the Pacific Ocean instead of readying for college like most his age.
His lawyer indicated that after a few weeks of processing, Sun will be headed back to his native Taiwan.
Officially called the Republic of China, Taiwan is all that remains of the Chinese Civil War’s loser. The island is in a precarious position, because less than 100 miles away, the People’s Republic of China is waiting for the day they get to finish their civil war for good.
It seems the judge took a very Trump-like approach with this by skipping a harsh jail sentence at the expense of the U.S. taxpayer. Instead, citizens will simply have to foot the bill for a single plane ticket.
With the price of a single inmate’s yearly stay in the Pennsylvania prison system totaling a whopping $42,727 according to 2015 numbers from the Vera Institute of Justice, Sun’s potential 10-year stay could have cost the state over $400,000.
A one-way ticket to beautiful and scenic Taiwan is less than $700.
Make America great again, indeed.
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