Texas man who stormed Capitol with gun gets longest prison term
A Texas man convicted of storming the U.S. Capitol with a holstered handgun, helmet, and body armor was sentenced Monday to more than seven years in prison, the longest sentence imposed so far among hundreds of Capitol riot cases. Prosecutors said Guy Reffitt told fellow members of the Texas Three Percenters militia group that he planned to drag House Speaker Nancy Pelosi out of the Capitol building by her ankles, “with her head hitting every step on the way down,” according to a court filing. Reffitt’s prison sentence — seven years and three months — is two years more than the previous longest prison sentence for a Capitol riot defendant. But it’s less than half the length of the 15-year prison term requested by a federal prosecutor, who called Reffitt a domestic terrorist and said he wanted to physically remove and replace members of Congress. Reffitt was the first person to go on trial for the January 6, 2021, attack, in which supporters of then-President Donald Trump halted the joint session of Congress for certifying Joe Biden’s 2020 electoral victory. U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich, who presided over Reffitt’s jury trial, also sentenced him to three years of supervised release after his prison term and ordered him to pay $2,000 in restitution. Sentencing guidelines calculated by the judge called for a term of imprisonment ranging from seven years and three months to nine years. Friedrich rejected prosecutors’ contention that an “upward departure for terrorism” — leading to a far longer sentence — was warranted in Reffitt’s case. It was the first time that prosecutors have requested that sentencing enhancement for a January 6 case. “He wanted to physically and literally remove Congress,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Jeffrey Nestler told the judge. “We do believe that he is a domestic terrorist.” Friedrich, however, questioned why Reffitt would merit the terrorism enhancement when many other rioters engaged in violence and made similarly disturbing threats. The longest sentence before Reffitt’s was five years and three months for two men who pleaded guilty to assaulting police officers at the Capitol. Reffitt, who already has been jailed for approximately 19 months, initially balked at speaking to the judge during Monday’s hearing. But he changed his mind during a lunch break and offered an expletive-laden apology to police officers, lawmakers, and congressional staffers who were at the Capitol on January 6. Calling himself “an idiot,” Reffitt struggled to explain why he stormed the Capitol. “It was a big blur,” he said. “It was just very chaotic and confusing.” Friedrich questioned the sincerity of Reffitt’s apology and expressions of remorse, noting that he has been publishing statements from jail in which he portrays himself and other rioters as patriots who were justifiably rebelling against a tyrannical U.S. government. “Not only are they not patriots, they are direct threats to our democracy and will be punished as such,” the judge said. Reffitt suggested that his fiery rhetoric from prison was hyperbole necessary to raise money to support his family. “I’m on the street if I don’t say something that would garner money for them,” he said. Defense attorney Clinton Broden asked for Reffitt to be sentenced to no more than two years in prison. Broden noted that Reffitt didn’t assault any law enforcement officers or enter the Capitol building. Videos captured the confrontation between outnumbered Capitol police officers and a mob of people, including Reffitt, who approached them on the west side of the Capitol. Reffitt was armed with a Smith & Wesson pistol in a holster on his waist, carrying zip-tie handcuffs, and wearing body armor and a helmet equipped with a video camera when he advanced on the officers, according to prosecutors. He retreated after an officer pepper sprayed him in the face, but he waved on other rioters who ultimately breached the building, prosecutors said. Reffitt didn’t testify at his trial before jurors convicted him in March of all five counts in his indictment. The jury found him guilty of obstructing Congress’ joint session, of interfering with police officers outside the Capitol, and of threatening his two teenage children if they reported him to law enforcement. Reffitt’s 19-year-old son, Jackson, testified that his father told him and his sister, then 16, that they would be traitors if they reported him to authorities and warned them that “traitors get shot.” Guy Reffitt was a member of the Texas Three Percenters militia group, according to prosecutors. The Three Percenters movement refers to the myth that only 3% of Americans fought in the Revolutionary War against the British. Reffitt lived with his wife and children in Wylie, Texas, a Dallas suburb. He drove to Washington, D.C., with Rocky Hardie, a fellow member of the militia group. Hardie testified that both of them were armed with holstered handguns when they attended Trump’s “Stop the Steal” rally before the riot. Hardie also said Reffitt gave him two pairs of zip-tie cuffs in case they needed to detain anybody. More than 840 people have been charged with federal crimes related to the riot. Over 340 of them have pleaded guilty, mostly to misdemeanors. More than 220 have been sentenced, with nearly half of them receiving terms of imprisonment. Approximately 150 others have trial dates stretching into 2023. Reffitt is one of seven Capitol riot defendants to get a jury trial so far. Jurors have unanimously convicted all seven of them on all counts in their respective indictments. Republished with the permission of The Associated Press.
Man blaming Donald Trump’s ‘orders’ for riot actions found guilty
An Ohio man who claimed he was only “following presidential orders” from Donald Trump when he stormed the U.S. Capitol was convicted Thursday by a jury that took less than three hours to reject his novel defense for obstructing Congress from certifying Joe Biden’s presidential victory. The federal jury also found Dustin Byron Thompson, 38, guilty of all five of the other charges in his indictment, including stealing a coat rack from an office inside the Capitol during the riot on January 6, 2021. The maximum sentence for the obstruction count, the lone felony, would be 20 years imprisonment. Jurors didn’t buy Thompson’s defense, in which he blamed Trump and members of the president’s inner circle for the insurrection and for his own actions. One juror who spoke to reporters only on condition of anonymity said, “Donald Trump wasn’t on trial in this case.” The juror, a 40-year-old man, said as he left the courthouse, “Everyone agrees that Donald Trump is culpable as an overall narrative. Lots of people were there and then went home. Dustin Thompson did not.” Thompson himself, testifying a day earlier, admitted he joined the mob’s attack and stole the coat rack and a bottle of bourbon. He said he regretted his “disgraceful” behavior. “I can’t believe the things that I did,” he said. “Mob mentality and groupthink is very real and very dangerous.” Still, he said he believed Trump’s false claim that the election was stolen and was trying to stand up for him. “If the president is giving you almost an order to do something, I felt obligated to do that,” he said. U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton, who is scheduled to sentence Thompson on July 20, described the defendant’s testimony as “totally disingenuous” and his conduct on January 6 as “reprehensible.” The judge also cast blame in Trump’s direction after the verdict was announced. “I think our democracy is in trouble,” he said, adding that “charlatans” like Trump don’t care about democracy, only about power. “And as a result of that, it’s tearing our country apart,” the judge said. Prosecutors did not ask for Thompson to be detained immediately, but Walton ordered him held, and he was led away handcuffed. The judge said he believed Thompson was a flight risk and posed a danger to the public. Thompson’s trial was the third to go before a jury among hundreds of Capitol riot cases prosecuted by the Justice Department. In the first two cases, jurors also convicted the defendants of all charges. Assistant U.S. Attorney William Dreher said that Thompson, a college-educated exterminator who lost his job during the COVID-19 pandemic, knew he was breaking the law when he joined the mob that attacked the Capitol and, in his case, looted the Senate parliamentarian’s office. The prosecutor told jurors that Thompson’s lawyer “wants you to think you have to choose between President Trump and his client.” “You don’t have to choose because this is not President Trump’s trial. This is the trial for Dustin Thompson because of what he did at the Capitol on the afternoon on January 6,” Dreher told jurors during his closing arguments. Defense attorney Samuel Shamansky said Thompson hasn’t avoided taking responsibility for his conduct that day. “This shameful chapter in our history is all on TV,” Shamansky told jurors. But he said Thompson, unemployed and consumed by a steady diet of conspiracy theories, was vulnerable to Trump’s lies about a stolen election. He described Thompson as a “pawn” and Trump as a “gangster” who abused his power to manipulate supporters. “The vulnerable are seduced by the strong, and that’s what happened here,” Shamansky said. The judge had barred Thompson’s lawyer from calling Trump and ally Rudolph Giuliani as trial witnesses. But he ruled that jurors could hear recordings of speeches that Trump and Giuliani delivered on January 6, before the riot erupted. A recording of Trump’s remarks was played. Shamansky contended that Giuliani, the Trump adviser, and former New York City major, incited rioters by encouraging them to engage in “trial by combat” and that Trump provoked the mob by saying, “If you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.” But prosecutor Dreher told jurors that neither Trump nor Giuliani had the authority to “make legal” what Thompson did at the Capitol. The juror who spoke on condition of anonymity said he was “laughing under my breath” when Thompson testified he took the coat rack to prevent other rioters from using it as a weapon against police. Thompson was charged and convicted on six counts: obstructing Congress’ joint session to certify the Electoral College vote, theft of government property, entering or remaining in a restricted building or grounds, disorderly or disruptive conduct in a restricted building or grounds, disorderly or disruptive conduct in a Capitol building and parading, demonstrating or picketing in a Capitol building. He had driven from Ohio to Washington with a friend, Robert Lyon, who also was arrested less than a month after the riot. Lyon pleaded guilty in March to two misdemeanors — theft of government property and disorderly conduct — and is to be sentenced on June 3. Thompson and Lyon took an Uber ride into Washington on the morning of January 6. After Trump’s rally and speech near the White House, they headed to the Capitol. Thompson was wearing a bulletproof vest when he entered the building and went to the parliamentarian’s office. The FBI said agents later searched Lyon’s cellphone and found a video that showed a ransacked office and Thompson yelling: “Wooooo! ’Merica Hey! This is our house!” “(Trump) didn’t force you to go. He didn’t force you to walk every step of the way to the Capitol building, did he?” Dreher asked Thompson on Wednesday. “No,” Thompson said. “You chose to do that?” Dreher asked. “I was following presidential orders, but yes,” Thompson said. More than 770 people have been charged with federal crimes arising from the riot. Over 250 of them have pleaded guilty, mostly
