Man threatened to kill Black worker who didn’t give him Social Security card, feds say

A man is accused of threatening to kill a Black employee at a Social Security office in Washington because of his race, federal prosecutors said.

Now Steven L. Veres, 41, of Thurston County, is charged with a hate crime, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Washington.

Veres went with a friend on Feb. 16 to get a replacement Social Security card from the Social Security office in Olympia, prosecutors said. There, the employee informed him of the proper documents he needed for a new card, prosecutors said.

Veres returned to the office later that day with documents and became enraged with the employee when he told Veres the paperwork was not sufficient for a replacement Social Security card, prosecutors said.

He’s accused of hurling racial slurs at the worker and threatening to “assault and murder him,” according to prosecutors and a superseding indictment.

On Oct. 16, Veres appeared in federal court in Tacoma and was arraigned on charges of influencing a federal official by threat and interference with federally protected activities, the attorney’s office announced in a news release that day.

McClatchy News contacted federal public defenders representing Veres for comment on Oct. 17 and didn’t receive an immediate response.

The charge of influencing a federal official by threat carries a maximum penalty of up to 10 years in prison, according to the release.

If Veres is convicted of that charge, he could also face a $250,000 fine, the release said.

The charge of interference with a federally protected activity carries a maximum penalty of up to a year in prison, prosecutors said.

It falls under a federal hate crime law that “makes it a crime to use or threaten to use force to willfully interfere with a person’s participation in a federally protected activity because of race, color, religion, or national origin.”

Veres is due back in court on Nov. 28 for a jury trial, court records show.

This story was originally published October 17, 2023 at 1:15 PM.

Julia Marnin

McClatchy DC

Julia Marnin covers courts for McClatchy News, writing about criminal and civil affairs, including cases involving policing, corrections, civil liberties, fraud, and abuses of power. As a reporter on McClatchy’s National Real-Time Team, she’s also covered the COVID-19 pandemic and a variety of other topics since joining in 2021, following a fellowship with Newsweek. Born in Biloxi, Mississippi, she was raised in South Jersey and is now based in New York State.