A San Francisco jury found a New Jersey man guilty of felony hate crime charge of false imprisonment on Monday in the assault on Holocaust survivor and Boston University professor Elie Wiesel in 2007. Other charges were crime allegation, battery and elder abuse for pulling the 79-year-old Nobel laureate from a hotel elevator in February last year, informed John Runfola, the defense attorney.

According to Runfola’s statement, the jury found 24-year-old Eric Hunt not guilty on felony charges of attempted kidnapping and stalking. Insanity was invoked as a defense after Hunt was extradited to San Francisco from a New Jersey mental hospital.

Wiesel, Jewish writer and political activist, was not hurt in the incident. He is renowned for his more than 40 books, the most notorious being “Night,” a memoir on the Holocaust that describes the experiences he underwent during the genocide and his captivity in several concentration camps. When he was deported by the Nazis to Auschwitz he was only 15. Wiesel was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1986 for writing and protesting against violence, oppression and racism.

Wiesel stated under oath how Hunt yanked him out of a hotel elevator on the sixth floor, saying he had to interview him. As soon as Wiesel got out from the elevator, he called for help.

Hunt has a sentencing hearing August 13, said his lawyer. False imprisonment felony count carries a maximum three-year sentence. For the reason that Hunt has been in police custody for 18 months, for good-conduct he will most likely be released after sentencing next month.