ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1995, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, December 2, 1995 TAG: 9512030030
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JAN VERTEFEUILLE STAFF WRITER
Harold Michael McTeer walked into federal court Friday looking as if he had spent the last eight months in a gulag rather than the Roanoke City Jail.
McTeer has been on a hunger strike on and off since the spring. Since the end of October, he has eaten almost nothing.
Never a big man, McTeer is down to 103 pounds, his sister said. Sitting at the defense table, his bones jutted through his T-shirt and his gaunt face was as ashen as his gray hair.
He spent most of the time with his head in his hands as U.S. District Judge Jackson Kiser sentenced him to 18 months on charges of threatening his ex-wife through a years-long campaign of letter writing.
McTeer, 38, said he believed he was a political prisoner, held because he has not made child-support payments totaling more than $30,000. He blames his former spouse, Tina Walton, for ruining his life and not letting him see his two children since they were very young.
He said he hadn't considered himself a father since Walton denied him visitation with his sons in 1981 and thus was not responsible for support. McTeer has written to everyone from local child-support enforcement agencies to national politicians questioning the child-support system.
In a "declaration of intent" about his first hunger strike this spring, McTeer wrote, "If charged and confined, I would consider myself a political prisoner and in political protest would undertake a hunger strike. This is all I have left. Thus, the only person I have `threatened' is myself."
Walton lives in Covington and McTeer in California. Kiser ordered that McTeer, who has been held without bond since March, be incarcerated in a prison near his family.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Tony Giorno said McTeer had "engaged in what can only be categorized as emotional terrorism" by writing constantly to his ex-wife, sometimes several letters a day. The tone became more hostile, Walton testified at his September trial, after she began pursuing back child support in 1990.
The FBI interviewed McTeer in California at one point, warning him that the U.S. attorney's office was prepared to prosecute. Afterward, an FBI agent testified, the threats increased and got angrier.
"Many of his actions during the trial would indicate Mr. McTeer does not hold the same views most of society holds," his attorney, Peter Katt, told the judge. But, he said, "He's not a danger to society."
A grand jury indicted McTeer on 20 counts, but Kiser let the jury consider only 15 of them that could be interpreted as containing veiled threats. The jury found him guilty of eight counts and found the other seven not threatening.
McTeer was hospitalized this week, but his condition was not life threatening and doctors could not force him to eat against his will, U.S. Marshal Larry Mattox said. After his sentencing Friday, McTeer was transferred to another hospital with a "secure facility," Mattox said.
"He's going to be hospitalized because he's in a weakened condition. We're trying to show a little compassion to this individual."
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