A self-described member of the extremist Proud Boys group allegedly used Parler to threaten the life of Georgia Senator-elect Raphael Warnock and discuss traveling to the US Capitol to cause violence, authorities said Wednesday.
Eduard Florea, 40, was arrested at his home in Queens, New York, by the FBI on Tuesday night. There, authorities said they found more than 1,000 rounds of ammunition despite Florea previously having been convicted in 2013 of a firearms-related felony.
Appearing in Brooklyn Federal Court, he was charged with being a convicted felon in possession of ammunition. If convicted, he faces 10 years in prison.
"For those of you out there with similar intentions, heed this warning — knock it off, or expect to see us at your door,” said FBI Assistant Director-in-Charge William Sweeney.
Citing unnamed law enforcement sources, multiple media outlets reported that Florea has described himself online as a member of the Proud Boys, the white nationalist and misogynist hate group.
According to a criminal complaint, Florea allegedly ran an account on Parler with the handle LoneWolfWar.
Last week, on the morning of the insurrection at the Capitol and the day after Warnock defeated Republican Sen. Kelly Loeffler, Florea responded to another user who had written "FUCK RAPHAEL WARNOCK LOSER" by writing, "Dead man can't pass shit laws."
Later that day, he allegedly wrote, "Let's go...I will be reaching out to patriots in my area so we can come up with a game plan...Here in New York we are target rich ... Dead men can't pass shit laws ... I will fight so help me god."
He was then said to have written several Parler posts about armed men heading from New York to DC: "The time for peace and civility is over."
"It's time to unleash some violence," he also wrote.
Prosecutors said Florea did not ultimately travel to DC on Jan. 6.
Authorities also said that during an interview with investigators, he had admitted to owning the Parler account and the ammunition.
An attorney for Florea told BuzzFeed News they had no comment.
Since Parler was used to plan and incite the violence of last week, Apple and Google have stopped offering the app in their online stores. Amazon has also stopped hosting Parler because it did not moderate its violent content, forcing the app offline.
In Florea's criminal complaint, the FBI said Parler had been used to plan actions on Jan. 6 at the Capitol.
"Members of the group coordinated their activities using social media platforms, including Parler," read the complaint.
Dano-D on January 14th, 2021 at 00:24 UTC »
That hacker that downloaded Parler is the real MVP. The stuff that we’ll see in the near future and the exposure. Wow. Just Wow.
Edit: worth pointing out. It wasn’t really hacked data because it was a public and open API (i.e. Not password protected), as it is mentioned in the replies below.
Hashgordon65 on January 14th, 2021 at 00:24 UTC »
The proud boys are the biggest group of loser incels on the planet. So much of their rules are steeped in that woman hating ideology
Yamfish on January 14th, 2021 at 00:23 UTC »
I’m not gonna lie to you, if you had asked me yesterday if a Proud Boy had threatened to murder Warnock on Parler, I would have replied “don’t know but I’d just about guarantee it”.
It’s still outrageous that it happened, but... can’t say I’m even mildly surprised.