Nearly a year after the Vineland man turned the steps of a DC cathedral into an explosives cache ahead of the annual Red Mass, Geri was sentenced to 70 months in federal prison.
The 42-year-old brought more than 100 homemade explosive devices to St. Matthew's Cathedral in the 1700 block of Rhode Island Avenue NW, where Supreme Court justices and other high-ranking government officials were expected the next morning.
It all started with a tent after Geri rode to DC and set up shop outside the cathedral on Oct. 4, 2025, where he stayed overnight. By the following morning, members of the Metropolitan Police Department sought to clear him out before the Red Mass, but he had broader ambitions.
Inside the tent, court documents state that Geri assembled more than 100 explosive devices he had manufactured from materials — including nitromethane, magnesium, charcoal, and thermite — purchased in Arkansas and assembled in Virginia.
The Red Mass, a high-profile annual religious ceremony attended by members of the Supreme Court, Cabinet, Congress, and the diplomatic corps, was scheduled for the following day on Oct. 5, 2025.
At around 5 a.m. that morning, prosecutors say officers instructed Geri to move, at which point he refused, and threatened to throw one of the devices into the street "to demonstrate its destructive power."
He told officers that "several of your people are gonna die from one of these" if federal agents did not come to negotiate his demands.
Geri had plenty of demands. Nine pages of them.
Those demands, according to prosecutors, included hundreds of thousands of dollars in payments to himself and others, extended accommodations at the Mayflower Hotel, an expatriation flight to Japan, and requests that the Supreme Court remove Arizona from the United States and declare it a “foreign enemy.”
He also made numerous demands directed at leaders of the Catholic and Jewish faiths.
Officers swarmed to the area until Geri eventually stepped out around 5:53 a.m. with an explosive device in his pocket with a butane lighter.
A search of the tent revealed more than 100 additional devices. Testing by an FBI laboratory confirmed the devices were improvised explosive devices in operable condition.
His confession was equally bizarre.
Following his arrest, Geri waived his Miranda rights and described the devices as “grenades” and “rockets.”
He further admitted that he intended to use the threat of force to coerce negotiations and that he was willing to use the devices to harm people and property — including St. Matthew's Cathedral, the White House, the Washington Monument, the US Capitol, and the Supreme Court.
Geri was sentenced to 70 months in prison, followed by three years of supervised release after pleading guilty in March to a count of Hobbs Act extortion by wrongful use of force, violence, or fear, and to a count of possession of an unregistered firearm (destructive device).
Prosecutors had sought 87 months behind bars.
“The First Amendment will be respected in the District of Columbia," US Attorney Jeanine Pirro said following Geri's sentencing. "Threatening to detonate explosive devices at a house of worship during an important historic religious service, known as the Red Mass, is an attack on our community and on the fundamental right to worship freely."
"Geri chose to terrorize a sacred space, St. Matthew’s Cathedral, and endanger officers and parishioners, thereby preventing Supreme Court justices from attending an annual religious event."
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