Jury convicts man of spray painting ‘shame’ and ‘rape’ on GOP office in Illinois
An Illinois jury found a man guilty Wednesday of vandalizing a local Republican Party headquarters last year, according to local media reports.
The man convicted — 43-year-old Timothy Damm of Rockford — was taken into custody last October, just days after the building housing the Winnebago County GOP headquarters in the Illinois city was spray painted with the words “rape” and “shame,” the Winnebago County State’s Attorney’s Office said in a news release last year announcing charges against Damm.
Damm was convicted on criminal defacement charges, according to WREX.
The TV station reported that authorities suspected the vandalism “was related to the Supreme Court case involving nominee Judge Brett Kavanaugh, who was under scrutiny for alleged sexual misconduct during that time.”
The trial began earlier this week, with the 12 jurors selected Monday, WTVO reports.
The date “9/27/18″ was also found spray painted on the building, the Rockford Register Star reports. That was the date that Kavanaugh, President Donald Trump’s nominee to the high court, and Christine Blasey Ford, the woman who accused Kavanaugh of sexually assaulting her during high school, testified before a U.S. Senate Committee about the allegations.
Damm will be sentenced on Jan. 9, according to the Register Star.
The charge Damm was convicted on is a felony “punishable by a sentence of 1-3 years in the Illinois Department of Corrections,” according to prosecutors.
Damm said in an earlier interview with WTVO — as he stood in front of the newly painted vandalism, apparently before his arrest — that he had been up the night of the incident.
“I had trouble sleeping last night, you know, just with everything that’s been going on with the Supreme Court and everything,” Damm told WTVO. “So I didn’t sleep well, but I didn’t see anything.”
Damm told the TV station that “I haven’t been great having the Republicans right in my neighborhood. That someone labeled them for what they are, I’m happy about that.”
This story was originally published November 6, 2019 at 3:48 PM with the headline "Jury convicts man of spray painting ‘shame’ and ‘rape’ on GOP office in Illinois."
