East Jordan man charged with threatening Biden, others

TRAVERSE CITY — An East Jordan man is facing federal charges for threatening to kill President Joe Biden and making bomb threats to a California military base, a South Dakota sheriff's office and a café in downtown Bellaire, among other targets.

Preston Mikottis, 36, was charged Friday in federal court with one count of willfully making a threat to kill, injure or intimidate an individual or unlawfully damage a building with an explosive device, and one count of making a threat against the president of the United States.

"I plan on killing the president," Mikottis, according to court documents, said during a Nov. 5, 2021, phone call to the FBI's Detroit field office. "I planted bombs at the White House. I planted bombs all over Michigan."

No attorney is listed for Mikottis in court documents.

Mikottis, who court records show provided his name, address, telephone number and partial Social Security number to the FBI, is accused of making these and other threats over an 18-month period, from November 2021 to April 2023.

Mikottis — or someone using Mikottis’ name — was active on social media Tuesday, at one point posting a link to the federal complaint.

The 15-page document was signed by Daniel L. Olson, an agent with the FBI's Detroit office who identified himself as assigned to Traverse City.

An FBI spokesperson for the Detroit office, Mara Schneider, declined to comment when asked whether Mikottis had been arrested; some social media pages associated with Mikottis were no longer online by Tuesday afternoon.

By Tuesday evening, Tiffany Brown, a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney of the Western District of Michigan, confirmed that Mikottis was not in custody but declined to make any further comment, citing the ongoing nature of the case.

Agents with the U.S. Secret Service interviewed Mikottis some time in early November 2021, court records state. Mikottis apparently apologized for making threats against the president and said he had no intention or means to carry them out.

Mikottis had identified himself to the FBI as a U.S. Marine and, at one point, requested to have a USMC officer visit him at his house, although when a detective with the Antrim County Sheriff's Office attempted to make a welfare check, records state Mikottis refused to come to the door.

A Michigan State Trooper, Nicholas Reszka, also was unsuccessful in making contact with him, court records show.

By March 2022, "C.O.," a woman identified in court documents as Mikottis’ former girlfriend, successfully petitioned the court for a personal protection order against Mikottis.

C.O. told authorities that, on Nov. 5, 2021, she moved out of the East Jordan home she’d lived in with Mikottis, ended her relationship with him and eventually left Michigan.

The timing of the threats federal authorities say Mikottis made against President Biden, Camp Pendleton in California, a Rapid City, South Dakota, area sheriff's office, and a Washington, D.C., area U.S. Marine Corp. barracks appear to coincide with the November 2021 break-up, according to the complaint.

Then this year on Jan. 23, Jan. 29 and April 28, staff with the Corner Bistro in Bellaire received phone calls and/or text messages from a man they told authorities they believed was Mikottis and, at one point, had to close the restaurant because of a false bomb threat.

The caller identified themselves as "Preston," called and texted four to five times per minute, the court record states, disrupting business and worrying staff.

Agent Olson later determined some these communications were made with a Voice over Internet Protocol telephone number assigned to someone with the username "mikottisp," court records show.

It's possible this same VoIP-type service was used to conduct a "denial of service" attack on the Greenville, Mich., Department of Public Safety with more than 3,000 calls in 18 hours; make 500 calls over two days to C.O.'s family; and send hundreds of texts and emails to U.S. Secret Service Agent Austin Hunt.

"The communications were of an irrational nature," Olson stated in the federal complaint.

Mikottis is the second northern Michigan man to attract the attention of federal authorities investigating threats related to explosive devices, after being served with a PPO from a former romantic partner.

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