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Briton pleads guilty on Trump gun charges | Briton pleads guilty on Trump gun charges |
(about 11 hours later) | |
A British man accused of trying to shoot US presidential candidate Donald Trump has pleaded guilty to some of the charges he faced. | A British man accused of trying to shoot US presidential candidate Donald Trump has pleaded guilty to some of the charges he faced. |
Michael Sandford, 20, from Dorking, Surrey, was accused of trying to grab a police officer's gun to shoot Mr Trump at a Las Vegas rally on 18 June. | |
He pleaded guilty to being an illegal alien in possession of a firearm and disrupting an official function. | He pleaded guilty to being an illegal alien in possession of a firearm and disrupting an official function. |
His plea means he could be deported and his sentence reduced. | His plea means he could be deported and his sentence reduced. |
Sandford previously pleaded not guilty to charges of disrupting government business and official functions, being an illegal alien and possession of a gun and had been due to stand trial later this month. | |
He may have faced up to 20 years in a US prison if he had been convicted at trial. He is due to be sentenced on 13 December. | |
At a court in Nevada, he acknowledged he had been treated in the past for mental illness. | |
Entering his pleas, he said: "I tried to take a gun from a policeman to shoot someone with, and I'm pleading guilty." | |
His mother Lynne Sandford and the family's UK lawyer visited him in jail for the first time last week to persuade him to sign the plea agreement. | |
Mrs Sandford said: "Even though he has signed the plea agreement, which should be the best option, it won't necessarily happen that way. | |
"The judge at sentencing can either agree with what is in the plea bargain or he can totally overthrow that and impose a punishment of his own." | |
She added that her son told her he was "incredibly sorry and remorseful for everything," adding: "Everybody says this is not him - this is so opposite to what he is." | |
Sandford's lawyers said he suffers seizures, obsession-compulsion anxiety and autism spectrum disorders. | |
His mother said he was recently diagnosed as having had a psychotic episode at the time of the incident and should serve any sentence in a UK psychiatric hospital. |