Writer of Letters to Katarina Witt Gets 37 Months : Sentence: Harry Veltman will be sent to a psychiatric hospital to serve his term.

SANTA ANA —  A Westminster man convicted of sending Olympic champion Katarina Witt obscene and threatening mail was sentenced Monday to more than three years in prison by a federal judge who cited the defendant’s “continuing denial of responsibility” for his acts.

Harry Veltman III, a 47-year-old former crop duster, will serve the sentence in a psychiatric hospital. He was convicted March 12 of six counts of sending graphic letters and photos of himself to the German skater in hopes of getting her to marry him.

After the sentencing, Veltman’s mother, Betty J. Hall, said she is gratified that her son is going to a treatment facility. “Jail is not where he needs to go,” she said.

Veltman, whose condition has been diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenia, at times has claimed to be a presidential candidate and also to have discovered a cure for AIDS and the location of Noah’s Ark.

In his misguided pursuit of the skating champion, Veltman traveled to Germany to Witt’s house, where he engaged her in a half-hour conversation in her yard; to Denver, where he threw letters to her on the rink while Witt was performing in an ice show; and to San Francisco, where he got into a hotel elevator with her.

On Dec. 26, the day he was arrested, Veltman went to the Great Western Forum in Inglewood, where Witt was scheduled to perform that night, and attempted to contact her again.

Witt testified during the two-day trial, in which Veltman defended himself, that she “believed he was going to kill me.” She could not be reached for comment after the sentencing.

U.S. District Judge Gary L. Taylor sentenced Veltman to 37 months in prison, to be followed by three years of supervised probation, during which he is also required to be in an approved psychological or psychiatric counseling program.

There is no parole in the federal system, and the maximum time off that Veltman can receive for good behavior is just over five months, prosecutors said. He has already been in jail for more than five months, so he will have to serve at least 27 more, and if doctors at the U.S. Bureau of Prisons believe that he constitutes a danger to society at the end of his term, prosecutors can petition the court to keep him in custody.

Veltman, wearing a shirt with no collar and a borrowed sport jacket that was too large for his small frame, explained the letters he sent to Witt as “a fabrication of my imagination” that he intended to be erotic.

“I never meant to harass her,” Veltman said. “I apologize to her,” he said, pledging never to contact her again.

Taylor called the affair “a highly unusual case,” saying that, while Veltman acknowledges what he did, “it is evident that Mr. Veltman has not accepted responsibility to this day.”

Taylor said that Veltman is “a very intelligent man” who was “not delusional considering many aspects of this case” when defending himself.

At the same time, Taylor said, Veltman persisted in acting in a way that is “destructive to himself and, more importantly, destructive to others.”

Although no violence took place, Taylor said, “no person should have to undergo” what Witt did.

The real question before him, Taylor said, was “how to cause some good to come out of all this?” Veltman has “great potential for good if his determination can be refocused,” Taylor said, as he sentenced him to the psychiatric treatment.

The goal of such treatment, the judge said, is “to bring some good to Mr. Veltman’s life.”

Veltman’s mother, Hall, said: “I want to thank the judge. I think he was trying to be extremely fair.”

Hall said her son’s acts had made a victim of both Veltman and Witt. This was “a big waste of Harry’s life” and “trauma in her life,” she said.