A man near Iliamna is charged with making threats to Alaska’s public safety commissioner and several federal agencies, according to Alaska State Troopers.
Court records show Jay Anelon, 38, charged with two counts each of third-degree assault and terroristic threatening in connection with the calls. He also faces a third-degree criminal mischief charge for allegedly throwing rocks at a neighbor’s house. All of the charges are felonies.
According to charging documents, Village Public Safety Officer Kenneth Brockman responded Dec. 27 to a home in Newhalen, a community of about 180 people 5 miles south of Iliamna. A man reported that someone was throwing rocks at his home.
“With the use of a high-powered flashlight, he observed a man hiding in the bushes about 10 yards from his home,” troopers wrote. “There was no one else outside in the area. (He) shined the flashlight at the man’s face, who then made a statement about ‘illegal operations’ and walked across the street to his house.”
The caller told Brockman that he recognized the man as Anelon. He also said Anelon had allegedly thrown rocks at his house in prior incidents he didn’t report. The VPSO examined the home, finding fist-sized rocks thrown at it had caused about $1,500 of damage to window shutters and siding.
On the same day, troopers said, the local VPSO office had been vandalized. Rocks were thrown through windows at the office, with windows broken on a patrol vehicle.
“The door to the VPSO office had graffiti spray painted on the door stating, ‘illegal operation,’” troopers wrote.
Brockman told troopers Anelon “appears to suffer from delusional thoughts.” He also said he had received voice messages in which Anelon threatened to kill him.
Anelon is then accused of making threatening phone calls to multiple agencies over several days in January.
The office of Public Safety Commissioner James Cockrell, who oversees troopers and VPSOs, reported receiving a voicemail message on Friday, Jan. 10. In it, a man accused Cockrell’s office of trying to help the neighbor and Brockman “cover up their illegal operation here in Iliamna.”
“I know what you look like, and I will kill you,” the caller allegedly said. “I am going to kill Kenneth Brockman, (expletive) you.”
Over the same weekend, the charges say, a man called the FBI office in Anchorage and the Pentagon’s operations center. He told both agencies that he planned to blow up the Anchorage FBI building. A search did not turn up any suspicious items in or near the building.
A few days later, a man called both a troopers’ dispatch center and the Anchorage FBI office and threatened to blow up trooper buildings.
The state’s suicide prevention hotline also reported receiving texts late last month from someone, troopers said, who threatened the home of VPSO Brockman and his family.
All of the calls and texts, troopers said, came from the same phone number Brockman reported Anelon had used to leave the messages threatening him.
When troopers traveled to Newhalen to arrest Anelon, they said he had to be forcibly restrained. A phone on his bed seized as evidence allegedly rang when troopers called the number from which the threats came.
Troopers said Anelon told them nobody had borrowed or used his phone.
“He informed (troopers) he had called the FBI, White House, Pentagon, and the CIA,” troopers said in the charging document.
Anelon was being held Friday at the Anchorage Correctional Complex. He is being represented by a public defender who could not immediately be reached for comment on Friday.
