ST. CLAIRSVILLE — Holloway Mayor Joseph Schaeffer, who was found guilty of threatening to blow up the Belmont County Courthouse, will spend 10 days in the Belmont County Jail for aggravated menacing.

According to testimony at his trial in Belmont County Western Division Court, Schaeffer threatened to blow up the courthouse during multiple phone calls made to the Belmont County Auditor’s Office this past February. He originally was charged with aggravated menacing and inducing panic but was found innocent by a jury of inducing panic.

Belmont County Western Division Court Judge Eric Costine sentenced Schaeffer to 180 days in jail, but suspended all but 10 days and ordered Schaeffer to be on probation for two years and to have no contact with Belmont County Auditor Cindi Henry or her employees Nicole Alexander and Courtney Temple.

Schaeffer was also ordered to pay $10 in jury fees.

The threat came during a phone call placed by Schaeffer to the Belmont County Auditor’s Office concerning the recent property tax increase in the county. At the June trial, Temple testified that she was trying to help Schaeffer until he said that he was going to blow the courthouse up, at which time she hung up the phone.

Costine addressed Schaeffer after the sentencing, saying that he has known Schaeffer for a long time and, although he believes he is a good person, he has been known to have a fierce temper so he wanted to issue the 10 days.

“I’m going to allow you to pick what day you want to start,” Costine said. “You don’t have to pick today necessarily. You can think about it, and then your counsel can file a commencement date for your jail sentence, but I need it all to be served within the next 45 days.”

Schaeffer asked if he would be allowed to serve his sentence during the weekend. Costine declined, ruling that all 10 days will need to be served consecutively.

Costine added that Schaeffer has one week to decide when he will begin serving his sentence.

Schaeffer then spoke and said that he apologizes to Henry, Alexander and Temple, saying that he understands that he was in the wrong.

Before Schaeffer was sentenced, his attorney Brandon Lippert of Lippert Law said that he believes that from the defense’s perspective, this case is about the limits of constitutional rights.

“He was a person trying to speak to the government and did so in a way that was unacceptable, and eight members of the community found it to be unacceptable,” Lippert said. “He is a blue collar citizen that tried to speak to the government, and for those reasons we are asking for the entire consequences to be suspended.”