Houston woman who sent package bombs to Obama, Greg Abbot tracked down through cat hair in envelopes, jailed for 10 years

A woman from Houston who mailed explosives to former President Barack Obama, Texas Governor Greg Abbott, and the acting director of the Social Security agency Carolyn Colvin, has been sentenced to a 10-year prison term.

The woman, identified as 47-year-old Julia Ann Poff, pleaded guilty in July to transporting the homemade explosives with an intent to kill, injure or intimidate. Poff reportedly sent all of the packages containing improvised booby traps in 2016. Two of the packages were eventually intercepted by postal authorities, however, the device mailed to Abbott was opened by him personally but it did not detonate. Reports state that it did not detonate because Abbot did not "open it the way it was designed to."

The mother-of-four was apprehended after the FBI managed to trace microscopically small amounts of pet hair found inside the envelopes and concluded that they came from the woman's gray cat named Ash. 

The 47-year-old, after the hearing on Monday, began reciting Bible verses and stated that her family had helped a lot of people in her locality, according to The Houston Chronicle. However, District Judge Vanessa Gilmore told her to explain her actions.

"Talk to me, don't be reading me Bible verses. I need to understand why you're saying you've done good for so many people and how that squares with the fact that you made bombs and sent them, with the intent to kill," the judge said, according to The Chronicle.

Poff replied while sobbing and said: "'I don't know what we're doing here. We had nothing to do with this. We did not do this." However, after talking to her attorney, she apologized saying: "All I can say is I'm sorry. I'm sorry to the people I've hurt."

Investigators involved in the case said that she admitted she did not like the former president. She is believed to have sent the explosives to Abbott and Colvin because she did not like the way the state dealt with her child support case. 

Authorities said that the amount of explosives hidden inside the packages had the potential to cause "severe burns and lots of severe injuries and possible death."

"The court finds the defendant's actions were calculated, pervasive and continuous over an extended period of time," Judge Gilmore said while sentencing Poff, adding that her actions put a lot of people in danger, including mail carriers and sorters working at postal depots.