Mayer L. Nehring

Mayer L. Nehring, a pharmacist and "Jewish anarchist" from Cleveland, Ohio, was sentenced to nineteen years in prison. According to a Department of Justice Report, the federal judge who sentenced Nehring gave him "the extreme sentence because it seemed to the judge that to allow him liberty would be as foolish as 'to keep a rattlesnake as a pet without removing its fangs.' " He served in Atlanta Penitentiary from February 24, 1919, to February 17, 1921. Nehring's sentence was commuted when he agreed to be deported to Russia and never to return to the United States. Nehring arrived in Russia, but the Soviet government refused him entry. He was returned to the United States, where he eventually received a presidential pardon.