Boston, Mass. - Today in U.S. District Court, Judge Joseph L. Tauro sentenced a Medford man to 36 months in prison for shining a powerful green laser beam into a State Police helicopter that was escorting an LNG tanker through Boston Harbor, then lying about it to law enforcement.

GERARD SASSO, 52, is the second person in the nation, and the first in Massachusetts, to be convicted of lasering an aircraft. Today’s sentencing follows Sasso’s convictions for willfully interfering with an aircraft operator with reckless disregard for human life and making false statements.

The evidence introduced at trial established that on December 8, 2007, a State Police helicopter was escorting a liquid natural gas tanker through Boston Harbor to the Distrigas Terminal in Everett. At approximately 9:15 p.m., the helicopter pilots saw a strange green light coming directly towards the cockpit and immediately recognized it as a laser beam. Despite taking evasive action to avoid being hit, the pilots were struck by the laser beam, which filled the entire cockpit with an intense sparkling green light.

The pilots viewed the laser beam as a potential threat to themselves, to the LNG tanker, and to planes landing at nearby Logan Airport. With the assent of the Coast Guard, which was supervising the LNG escort mission, the pilots began flying an “S” shaped pattern towards the beam in order to identify its source without being struck in the face by the laser. As they flew closer to the beam’s source, the beam kept following them, and it struck the helicopter at least four more times. The pilots were eventually able to determine that the beam was likely coming from a window in Sasso’s third-floor apartment, which is in Medford on the Medford/Somerville line.

Officers responded to Sasso’s apartment and interviewed him, at which time he falsely stated that he was not the person who had lasered the helicopter, that he knew nothing about the lasering incident, and that he owned no lasers. Sasso repeated these false statements several more times until officers noticed a laser pointer on his bedside table. Confronted with this evidence, Sasso confessed that he had, in fact, lasered the helicopter and that he had hidden the green laser in his baseboard heating system. Police recovered the green laser, along with 10 other lasers, from Sasso’s apartment.

U.S. Attorney Carmen M. Ortiz said, “This sentence should send a strong message that interfering with an aircraft in any way will result in aggressive prosecution and stiff sentences. Such actions endanger lives and disrupt air travel, and will not be tolerated.”

The laser used by Sasso is classified by the Food and Drug Administration as a Class IIIb laser, which is a type of laser designed only for light shows and industrial and research applications, not for use as a laser pointer or amusement device. It is at least five to ten times more powerful than an ordinary laser pointer and has a range of at least two miles.

Judge Tauro sentenced Sasso to concurrent terms of 36 months’ imprisonment, to be followed by two years of supervised release.

U.S. Attorney Ortiz; George Naccara, Federal Security Director for the Transportation Security Administration; Richard DesLauriers, Special Agent in Charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation - Boston Field Division; and Gregory K. Null, Special Agent in Charge of the Department of Homeland Security, Office of Inspector General Philadelphia Field Office made the announcement today.

The case was investigated by the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force, of which the Transportation Security Administration is a member, as well as by the Massachusetts State Police and Medford Police Department. It was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys William D. Weinreb and Donald L. Cabell of Ortiz’s National Security and Counter Terrorism Unit.

 

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