MORGANTOWN, W.Va. (AP) - As he tells it, Keith Russell Judd is a Harvard-educated musician and activist whose mother was a 1920s actress and father a designer of the first atomic bomb. He is also inmate No. 11593-051 at the Texarkana Federal Correctional Institute.
And from that cell in northeast Texas, without any organized support, he gave President Barack Obama a run for his money in West Virginia's primary, winning four of every 10 votes Democrats cast Tuesday.
Voters were not swayed by claims that Lillian Russell was his mother (even though she died before he was born), that he's a Rastafarian-Christian or that he attended the non-existent University of California at Los Alamos. They likely didn't know he's a fan of Mozart and Stephen King, that he belonged to Federation of Super Heroes from 1976 to 1982, or that he's doing 17 years for making threats at the University of New Mexico in 1999.
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Federal prisoner Keith Russell Judd is seen at the Beaumont Federal Correctional Institution in Beaumont, Texas, in this 2008 photo.
They just know he's not Obama.
Obama lost West Virginia to Republican John McCain in 2008 and has been to the state only once since he was elected - for a memorial service for 29 coal miners killed in the 2010 Upper Big Branch mine disaster.
Obama carried 59 percent of the vote to Judd's 41 percent - more than 72,400 votes. But nearly 25,000 voters failed to even bother with the presidential race, a condemnation by silence.
Unofficial results show Judd outpolled Obama in 10 coal-producing counties.
Judd's colorful resume and claims - from being a fortune teller, to founding an organization when he was 5 years old, to bowling a perfect game - are detailed in a biography on Project Vote Smart, a nonpartisan watchdog group.
Judd's younger brother, Monty Judd of Albuquerque, N.M., said Keith Judd graduated from a public high school in Albuquerque and studied music for several years at the University of New Mexico without graduating. He called his brother a "musical genius" who sang and played piano and electric base. He said only that their parents were deceased.
Monty Judd said he doesn't believe Keith Judd is dangerous, but he worries about his mental stability.
Federal court records show Keith Judd was sentenced to more than 17 years after being convicted in Odessa, Texas, for mailing a threat to kill a woman at the University of New Mexico.
David Clyne Greenhaw of Odessa was Judd's court-appointed attorney. Greenhaw said Judd's sanity was an issue in the trial, but that Judd was found competent. He said he has been receiving letters from Judd for years in which the return address says: Keith Russell Judd for President.
