2 get prison for threatening party, waving Confederate flag
DOUGLASVILLE, Ga. — A white man and a white woman who were among a large group of people waving Confederate flags and threatening violence at a black child’s birthday party in 2015 have been sentenced to lengthy prison terms.
Jose Ismael Torres, 26, and Kayla Rae Norton, 25, were part of a group of 15 people who disrupted the 8-year-old’s party in Douglasville in July 2015, less than a month after white supremacist Dylann Roof killed nine African-Americans at a historic black church in South Carolina.
Roof brandished Confederate flags in several photographs that came to light soon after his arrest and had said he intended to start a race war with the killings.
Torres and Norton were found guilty Monday of yelling racial slurs and threatening to kill partygoers, even the kids. At one point, Torres aimed a shotgun at the party, prosecutors said.