Montgomery Co. man pleads guilty to mailing threats against Jewish institutions in DC region

A Montgomery County, Maryland, man has pleaded guilty in federal court to mailing threatening letters and postcards to more than a dozen Jewish institutions in Maryland, Virginia, D.C. and elsewhere over the past 18 months, suggesting that buildings would be destroyed and people killed.

Clift Seferlis, 55, of Garrett Park, entered guilty pleas Monday in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania for 17 counts of mailing threatening communications and eight counts of obstruction of free exercise of religious beliefs. While most of the threats involved Jewish institutions in the D.C. area, some were mailed from Pennsylvania, where Seferlis visited often.

According to Seferlis’s plea memorandum, between March 2024 and June 2025, he used the U.S. mail system to send at least 40 letters and two postcards to more than 25 Jewish organizations and entities, including synagogues, Jewish museums, community centers, schools, nonprofit organizations and a delicatessen.

Read more: WTOP