NEW YORK - A police official at
a Massachusetts veterans hospital and a former New York City high school
librarian were charged in a plot to kidnap, rape, torture and kill women,
children and infants, authorities said Monday.
The case against Robert
Christopher Asch, 61, and Richard Meltz, 65, was built by many of the same
investigators who successfully prosecuted a former New York City police officer
on kidnap conspiracy charges in a high-profile cannibalism plot case.
A jury in that case last month
rejected defense arguments that Officer Gilberto Valle was engaging only in
demented Internet fantasies. He is awaiting sentencing.
There was no mention of cooking
or eating women in the charges unveiled Monday against Asch, a former librarian
at Stuyvesant High School in lower Manhattan, and Meltz, the chief of police at
the Bedford Veterans Administration Medical Center in Massachusetts. Both were
ordered held without bail after an initial court appearance.
Authorities said in court
papers filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan that the men conspired since
the spring of 2011 to attack multiple victims, including the relatives of an
unidentified co-conspirator who claimed in Internet communications that he
wanted to solicit individuals to kidnap, rape and kill his wife, his
sister-in-law and her children, and his stepdaughter. A criminal complaint said
the men referred to the planned killings in communications as the
"snuffing" of women, children and infants.
Authorities also accused the
pair of conspiring to kidnap and kill a woman who turned out to be an
undercover FBI agent. After hearing about the Valle case and how it was built
on online evidence, the men allegedly started communicating solely by telephone
as a precaution, unaware there was a wiretap, authorities said.
In court, prosecutors told a
magistrate judge that Meltz was overheard discussing killing his wife of 42
years. They also said Meltz had directed Asch to buy a Taser for the plot that
was recovered when Asch was arrested on Monday morning.
Defense attorney Peter Brill
said Meltz's wife was aware of his activities, but believes it's fantasy.
"She's very concerned
about her husband," he said in a failed bid for bail.
Afterward, he said in a response
to an email seeking comment that Meltz "is a devoted husband, a loving
father and a dedicated public servant. He never had any plan, intent or desire
to see anyone hurt or killed at any time in real life. For anyone to suggest
otherwise, despite his fantasy role-playing, is ludicrous."
Lori Cohen, Asch's attorney,
declined to comment.
FBI Assistant Director George
Venizelos said the men "were not confined to talking about these ghoulish
plans. They acquired the tools to accomplish the deed, including a stun gun and
the chemical means to anesthetize their victims. And they made detailed plans
to use these instruments -- plans that were foiled by the FBI's
intervention."