Woman sentenced to 18 years for conspiring to sabotage Baltimore substations, cause blackouts

A Maryland woman was sentenced Wednesday to 18 years in prison and a lifetime of supervised release for allegedly conspiring to sabotage electrical infrastructure in the Baltimore area. 

Sarah Beth Clendaniel, 36, of Catonsville, Maryland, was arrested in February along with Brandon Russell, an alleged neo-Nazi leader from Orlando, Florida. The FBI accused the pair of planning attacks on the power grids serving Baltimore.

“Sarah Beth Clendaniel sought to ‘completely destroy’ the city of Baltimore by targeting five power substations as a means of furthering her violent white supremacist ideology,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement.

FBI Director Christopher Wray said the sentence should deter others who attempt to carry out attacks on infrastructure.

According to Clendaniel’s plea agreement and other court documents, she and Russell espouse a white supremacist ideology and advocate a concept known as “accelerationism,” which holds that the current system is irreparable and without an apparent political solution. Therefore violent action is necessary to initiate societal and government collapse.

Russell is charged with conspiracy to damage or destroy electrical facilities and is awaiting trial.