A man from Queens pleaded guilty Thursday to making more than 12,000 harassing phone calls to members of Congress over an 18-month period in 2022 and 2023, as announced by federal prosecutors in Washington, D.C. Ade Salim Lilly, 35, pleaded guilty to one count of making interstate communications with a threat to kidnap or injure, punishable by up to five years in prison, and making repeated telephone calls, which carries up to a two-year prison term. He is scheduled to be sentenced Aug. 28 in Washington before U.S. District Judge Timothy J. Kelly, The Washington Post reports.
According to court documents, starting in February 2022 and continuing until his arrest in November 2023, Lilly made thousands of telephone calls to about 54 different congressional offices. Most were answered by congressional staff members or interns, prosecutors said. Lilly became angry and used vulgar and harassing language in the calls. During at least one call, Lilly threatened to kill or injure his listener. “I will kill you, I am going to run you over, I will kill you with a bomb or grenade,” prosecutors said Lilly told an aide in a call to an office in D.C. on Oct. 21, 2022. Staffers and Capitol Police repeatedly asked him to stop calling and warned that his unwanted calls were harassing and barred by law, but Lilly simply masked his phone number in response, prosecutors said.
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