Hundreds of rioters accused of violently assaulting police at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, were pardoned Monday by President Trump, despite remarks from his allies in recent weeks condemning those defendants.
More than 600 people who invaded the Capitol that day as lawmakers sought to certify the results of the 2020 election were charged with assaulting, resisting or impeding law enforcement — and nearly 200 of them did so using a deadly or dangerous weapon.
The crowds forced the evacuation of lawmakers who were set to certify the results of the election, and while they later returned to the Capitol that day to complete their work, more than 140 officers had been injured and some later died.
Trump’s sweeping pardons countered the messaging of his allies, many of whom condemned violent offenders until the stroke of his pen.
Vice President Vance said earlier this month that people who “committed violence” on Jan. 6 should “obviously” not receive pardons — though he walked that back to add that he and Trump care about “people unjustly locked up.”
Pam Bondi, Trump’s pick for attorney general, similarly condemned “any violence on a law enforcement officer in this country” during her confirmation hearing and vowed to help Trump look at the cases individually, if asked.
But the pardons showed little regard for the wide range of offenses among the rioters, instead encapsulating all of those who fought their way past police and into the Capitol building.
Here are five of the rioters who committed violent assaults that day but still received pardons.
David Dempsey
A Jan. 6 rioter with a history of political violence, David Dempsey was given one of the longest sentences in connection with the riot.
Prosecutors said he “viciously assaulted and injured police officers” at the Capitol that day, climbing over other rioters like “human scaffolding” to reach the front of the crowd. There, he began a “prolonged attack” on law enforcement using his hands, flagpoles, broken furniture, pepper spray and “anything else he could get his hands on.”
“Dempsey was one of the most violent rioters, during one of the most violent stretches of
time, at the scene of the most violent confrontations at the Capitol on January 6, 2021,” federal prosecutors wrote in their sentencing request to the judge.
He was previously convicted after spraying a crowd of anti-Trump protesters with bear repellent in 2019 while wearing a “Make America Great Again” cap, which the government said “ominously foreshadowed” his later assault at the Capitol.
U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth, a Reagan appointee, sentenced Dempsey to 20 years in prison, describing his conduct as “exceptionally egregious.”
Julian Khater
Julian Khater, who pleaded guilty to two counts of assaulting police with a dangerous weapon, aimed pepper spray at officers using a bike rack to hold back rioters.
One officer he sprayed, identified as “Officer B.S.” in court documents, was later identified as Brian Sicknick — a Capitol Police officer who had two strokes and died of natural causes the day after the riot.
Khater sprayed another officer identified in court documents as “Officer C.E.,” who was later identified as Caroline Edwards, one of the officers who testified before the now-defunct House Jan. 6 select committee.
Edwards testified before the panel that she engaged in “hours and hours of hand-to-hand combat” and remembered Sicknick looking “ghostly pale” after he was sprayed.
“It was carnage. It was chaos,” she said.
Shane Jenkins
Shane Jenkins used a metal tomahawk to shatter a Capitol window on Jan. 6, creating a new breach point that allowed rioters to stream into the building.
Once inside, federal prosecutors said Jenkins disassembled wooden furniture for makeshift weapons and hurled nine different objects at police, including a solid wooden desk drawer, a flagpole, a metal walking stick and a broken wooden pole with a “spear-like point … which he launched like a javelin.”
Jenkins was sentenced to seven years in prison.
Christopher Worrell
A member of Florida’s Proud Boys chapter, Christopher Worrell was convicted of assaulting police with a deadly and dangerous weapon and other felony counts.
After plotting with other Proud Boys members to disrupt the certification of the vote, prosecutors said Worrell headed to Washington where he yelled threats at Capitol Police officers and called them names. He later unloaded a full can of pepper spray on police, hitting at least three.
Days before he was set to be sentenced, Worrell cut off his ankle monitor in a Walmart parking lot and went on the run, triggering a six-week manhunt that ended in his arrest at his Florida home.
There, the FBI found night-vision goggles, camping gear and about $4,000 in cash, and they discovered Worrell unconscious. He later admitted to faking a drug overdose as a “delay tactic” and was sentenced to 10 years in prison.
Thomas Webster
Thomas Webster, a retired New York police officer, was sentenced to 10 years in prison after assaulting a police officer with a metal flagpole and attempting to rip off his gas mask.
Metropolitan Police Department officer Noah Rathbun testified that the confrontation began as he sought to move Webster back from a security perimeter. Webster slammed a bike rack at Rathbun, leading the officer to strike the side of Webster’s face. Then, Webster swung the metal flagpole at the officer.
As Rathbun grabbed for the pole, Webster tackled him to the ground and grabbed his gas mask, choking the officer by the chin strap as other rioters kicked him.
Prosecutors accused Webster of “disgracing a democracy that he once fought honorably to protect and serve.”
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