Man accused of plotting temple shooting pleads guilty


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SALT LAKE CITY -- A man suspected of plotting an attack on an LDS temple pleaded guilty to a firearms charge.

Benjamin Speakman, 27, pleaded guilty to owning an unregistered sawed-off shotgun.

Federal agents found that shotgun when they arrested Speakman in February.

He had told doctors at a Valley Mental Health facility in Midvale that he planned to go on a shooting rampage in the Jordan River Temple of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, where he would then kill himself.

Speakman told police he had recently stopped taking prescription medications.

He is scheduled to be sentenced in June.

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