A Clinton County jury has found a Calamus man guilty of making threats to poison the city of Calamus’s water supply.

Deputies arrested Jeffrey A. Soboroff, 57, 193 Second St., last November after he had made a posting to his Web site that he had procured 500 pounds of Thorizine and was going to dump the drug into the city water tower to “calm the population down.”

A Clinton County District Court jury convicted Soboroff on the second day of his trial this week. Sentencing has been set for March 27.

Clinton County Attorney Mike Wolf said making threats is a Class D felony, punishable by up to five years in prison. Wolf noted the sentencing judge also has many options, including granting Soboroff a deferred judgment or placing him on probation. He said fines can range from $750 to $7,500 and Soboroff could be ordered to pay restitution to the city of Calamus for the loss of water resulting from draining the city reservoir and water tower.

Jurors saw a video the defendant made when law enforcement agents arrived to search his residence - and later posted on Youtube -

Clinton County Sheriff’s Deputy Jessup Schroeder was the final prosecution witness to take the stand. Schroeder said he was present at the Soboroff residence, 193 Second St., Calamus, to serve the search warrant on Nov. 14. He stated Soboroff had a handheld video camera in his hand when he and Sgt. Steve Cundiff arrived at the door and later posted the video from the camera on the popular Internet video viewer YouTube.

Soboroff asks the deputies if they are “looking for 500 pounds of Thorizine.” Schroeder said a picture of the Calamus water tower, like the photo posted to Soboroff’s Web site, was found as the background on the screen of a Compaq laptop computer. When asked why a search was executed, Schroeder testified that law enforcement officials were seriously concerned there “might be a legitimate threat to the Calamus water tower.”

Under cross-examination by Soboroff’s attorney Bill Vilmont, Schroeder acknowledged that Soboroff had filed complaints against Calamus Public Works Director Duane Levien, and vice-versa, but would not say the two were “hostile” toward each other. Later, Schroeder said that in approximately two years of Soboroff living in Calamus, Schroeder had received several complaints from various Calamus citizens that Soboroff was following them around with a video camera.