A Georgian national known as “Commander Butcher” was sentenced to 15 years in federal prison after admitting he led an international neo‑Nazi group, urged mass violence, and plotted a poison candy attack aimed at Jewish and other minority children in New York City.
U.S. District Judge Carol Bagley Amon handed down a 15‑year sentence to Michail Chkhikvishvili, who used the alias “Commander Butcher,” after he pleaded guilty to soliciting hate crimes and sharing instructions to create bombs and ricin. Prosecutors say he was a leader of an organization that goes by several names, including Maniac Murder Cult and MKY, and that he recruited others to carry out violent, racially motivated attacks.
Authorities say Chkhikvishvili was extradited from Moldova to the Eastern District of New York in May 2025 and later admitted guilt in November. Investigators traced his activity back to at least 2021, and they say he used encrypted channels like Telegram to push violent plans and manuals to followers around the world.
“Chkhikvishvili, a leader of the ‘Maniacs Murder Cult,’ repeatedly called for the murder of innocent civilians, including children, and schemed to attack and terrorize Jewish communities and racial minorities in the United States,” said Assistant Attorney General for National Security John A. Eisenberg. “Chkhikvishvili, for example, tried to recruit a supposed associate to dress up as Santa Claus and pass out poisoned candy to minority children. Today’s sentence takes a monster off our streets and protects our communities at least for a time.”
Prosecutors detail a long pattern of solicitations. In June 2022, Chkhikvishvili traveled to Brooklyn, and beginning as early as July 2022 he allegedly urged others to commit mass violence, sometimes directly messaging what turned out to be an undercover FBI employee. The government says those contacts included plans for bombings, arsons, and a New Year’s Eve mass casualty scheme in New York City.
The plot evolved over months, according to court filings. By November 2023 Chkhikvishvili had reportedly directed operatives to poison candy handed out by someone dressed as Santa, and by January 2024 he had focused specific instructions on Jewish schools and children in Brooklyn while sending detailed manuals for lethal poisons and gases including ricin.
“The defendant plotted abhorrent acts of antisemitic and racially motivated violence,” said Assistant Attorney General Harmeet K. Dhillon of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division. “Individuals who plan and encourage this violence will not find refuge in the dark corners of the Internet. Together, with our law enforcement partners, we will relentlessly pursue these criminals and hold them accountable.”
The group’s ideology is described by prosecutors as neo‑Nazi and explicitly violent. Since around September 2021, Chkhikvishvili is accused of circulating a document called the “Hater’s Handbook” to members, a manifesto that the government says promotes school shootings and other mass attacks and contains his claim that he has “murdered for the white race.”
U.S. Attorney Joseph Nocella Jr. called the defendant a “hate‑mongering menace,” saying the man intended to harm and kill children in Jewish and minority communities in New York. “Thanks to our incredible law enforcement partners, he did not succeed and will now face justice for his cowardly acts,” Nocella said, stressing that prosecutors would pursue similar extremists vigorously.
Assistant Director Donald Holstead of the FBI’s Counterterrorism Division noted the international dimension of the case and the agency’s role in stopping the plot. “His twisted plans included poisoning children with candy around the holidays, but that plot was stopped thanks to the good work of the FBI and our law enforcement partners,” Holstead said, adding that extradition from Moldova shows violent actors cannot easily hide overseas.
The indictment and supporting materials link Chkhikvishvili’s rhetoric to real‑world attacks. Prosecutors point to a January 2025 shooting at Antioch High School in Nashville, Tennessee, where a 17‑year‑old killed one person and injured another before taking his own life; investigators say the attacker livestreamed parts of the attack and referenced Maniac Murder Cult and Chkhikvishvili in a recording.
They also cite an August 2024 stabbing outside a mosque in Eskisehir, Turkey, where a livestreamed attacker wearing a vest with Nazi symbols referenced Chkhikvishvili and shared the Hater’s Handbook. Those incidents are presented as part of a pattern in which the group’s propaganda inspired violence beyond the United States.
The prosecution team handling the case includes the Office’s National Security and Cybercrime Section and Assistant U.S. Attorneys Andrew D. Reich and Ellen H. Sise for the Eastern District of New York. Trial Attorney Justin Sher, Special Agent Kristoffer Borch, and paralegal specialists Rebecca Roth and Wayne Colon assisted, with additional help from the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division and multiple federal and international partners.
