UTICA — Timothy Day of Deerfield might have simply lost his temper when he threatened to kill Gov. David Paterson last year, but if he ever makes another racially-motivated threat like that again, he’s going to jail, an Oneida County Court judge warned Thursday. Judge Michael L. Dwyer made those comments when he sentenced 39-year-old Day, of Walker Road, to five years of probation rather than jail time for his guilty plea to aggravated second-degree harassment, a hate crime.
In September, Day left an angry threat to kill Paterson on the answering machine of state Assemblywoman RoAnn Destito, D-Rome, because he was upset with the governor after recently losing his laundromat business.
“Have you learned anything from this incident?” Dwyer asked.
“I made a mistake,” Day replied before apologizing to Paterson and Destito. “It won’t happen again.”
In the recorded late-night message to Destito, on Sept. 11, Day stated he was “sick” of African-Americans “running around … and hollering every time something is said, that it's racism.”
Day was referring comments Paterson made in response to former presidential candidate Arizona Sen. John McCain's running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, after she compared her previous political experience to then-Illinois Sen. Barack Obama's past work as a “community organizer.”
Paterson, who is black, said repeated use of the words “community organizer” was masked racism.
In Day’s recorded message, Day made a racist slur and then threatened the governor: “If I ever see that guy in Upstate New York … that blind black (expletive) ... I'll (expletive) kill him.”
When Dwyer then asked if Day’s comments were fueled by any inner deep-seated hatred, Day said it wasn’t.
“I was just hot-headed,” Day said. “I lost my temper.”