Man In Trouble After 12,000 Abusive Phone Calls To Congress

(PatriotPostNews.com) – A New York man has admitted to threatening the life of a staff member in Congress amid his spree of making thousands of intimidating phone calls to legislators.

Ade Salim Lilly, a 35-year-old from Queens, pleaded guilty on May 30 to charges related to his harassment of Congressional employees, which consisted of 12,000 phone calls that occurred during a period of less than two years. Among the charges against him are repeatedly making threatening calls as well as warning someone that he would kidnap or injure them.

According to the United States Attorney’s Office, over 6,526 phone calls were made to legislative offices in the nation’s capital between February 2022 and November 2023. The calls targeted 54 different Congressional members. Lilly was arrested at the end of last year and has been held in custody ever since. Following his guilty plea, federal Judge Timothy Kelly scheduled a sentencing hearing for August 28.

Court documents reveal that Lilly was “angry” and engaged in “vulgar and harassing language” directed towards those who answered his repeated calls, which were taken by both staff and interns within Congress. The suspect was reportedly asked to “refrain from calling” due to his “harassing communication,” court documents stated. Additionally, Capitol Police told him “on multiple occasions” that his phone calls were illegal due to the nature of his messaging.

Though the federal government did not identify specific lawmakers as having received threatening phone calls, a spokesperson for the Capitol Police did reveal that the members were from both political parties.

One of the 12,000 phone calls made in less than two years included an explicit life threat from Lilly. On October 21, 2022, the defendant said to a staff member in Congress that he was going to “kill you,” suggesting he would do so by “run[ning] you over,” “with a bomb,” or via grenade.

The calls led some staff members to “cease answering their phone[s]” due to the intimidating communication. One office, court documents show, was the target of over 500 calls from Lilly.