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Prosecutors are seeking 33-year prison sentences for former Proud Boys chair Enrique Tarrio and his ally Joe Biggs, who they say aimed to foment a revolution on Jan. 6 to keep former President Donald Trump in power.
The proposed jail sentences would nearly double the lengthiest Jan. 6 sentence handed down to date — 18 years for Oath Keepers leader Stewart Rhodes — a decision prosecutors say reflects the pivotal role that Proud Boys leaders played in stoking and exacerbating the violence at the Capitol that day.
“The defendants understood the stakes, and they embraced their role in bringing about a ‘revolution,'” prosecutors wrote in their sentencing memo released Thursday night. “They unleashed a force on the Capitol that was calculated to exert their political will on elected officials by force and to undo the results of a democratic election. The foot soldiers of the right aimed to keep their leader in power. They failed. They are not heroes; they are criminals.”
Both Tarrio and Biggs were convicted of seditious conspiracy in May by a jury who also found allies Philadelphia Proud Boy leader Zachary Rehl and Seattle Proud Boy leader Ethan Nordean guilty of the grave offense. Prosecutors are seeking 30 years for Rehl and 27 years for Nordean.
A fifth Proud Boy tried alongside the others, Dominic Pezzola, was acquitted of seditious conspiracy but convicted on other serious offenses. Pezzola may be the best known of the group, however. He shattered a Senate-wing window with a stolen police riot shield, triggering the breach of the Capitol itself. Prosecutors are seeking a 20-year jail term for him.
Nordean, Biggs, Pezzola and Rehl have been in prison since early 2021, and Tarrio has been in jail since his arrest in February 2022.
Prosecutors spent much of the memo describing the trauma the attack caused for members of Congress and outnumbered police officers, many of whom were injured defending the building. The attack, which the Justice Department says was sparked in significant ways by the Proud Boys, left a stain on American democracy. It was, in part, why prosecutors are urging the judge to deem their conduct “terrorism” — a designation that would result in sharply increased sentences.
“[W]hile freedom, democracy, and the Constitution prevailed on January 6th, it was not without cost,” they wrote. “Alongside the enduring legacy of bravery and honor by those who defended our country, a harsh reality has emerged — political violence is not some foreign concept that exists only in faraway lands, it exists here too.”
https://www.yahoo.com/news/prosecutors-seek-30-sentences-proud-024229751.html
The proposed jail sentences would nearly double the lengthiest Jan. 6 sentence handed down to date — 18 years for Oath Keepers leader Stewart Rhodes — a decision prosecutors say reflects the pivotal role that Proud Boys leaders played in stoking and exacerbating the violence at the Capitol that day.
“The defendants understood the stakes, and they embraced their role in bringing about a ‘revolution,'” prosecutors wrote in their sentencing memo released Thursday night. “They unleashed a force on the Capitol that was calculated to exert their political will on elected officials by force and to undo the results of a democratic election. The foot soldiers of the right aimed to keep their leader in power. They failed. They are not heroes; they are criminals.”
Both Tarrio and Biggs were convicted of seditious conspiracy in May by a jury who also found allies Philadelphia Proud Boy leader Zachary Rehl and Seattle Proud Boy leader Ethan Nordean guilty of the grave offense. Prosecutors are seeking 30 years for Rehl and 27 years for Nordean.
A fifth Proud Boy tried alongside the others, Dominic Pezzola, was acquitted of seditious conspiracy but convicted on other serious offenses. Pezzola may be the best known of the group, however. He shattered a Senate-wing window with a stolen police riot shield, triggering the breach of the Capitol itself. Prosecutors are seeking a 20-year jail term for him.
Nordean, Biggs, Pezzola and Rehl have been in prison since early 2021, and Tarrio has been in jail since his arrest in February 2022.
Prosecutors spent much of the memo describing the trauma the attack caused for members of Congress and outnumbered police officers, many of whom were injured defending the building. The attack, which the Justice Department says was sparked in significant ways by the Proud Boys, left a stain on American democracy. It was, in part, why prosecutors are urging the judge to deem their conduct “terrorism” — a designation that would result in sharply increased sentences.
“[W]hile freedom, democracy, and the Constitution prevailed on January 6th, it was not without cost,” they wrote. “Alongside the enduring legacy of bravery and honor by those who defended our country, a harsh reality has emerged — political violence is not some foreign concept that exists only in faraway lands, it exists here too.”
https://www.yahoo.com/news/prosecutors-seek-30-sentences-proud-024229751.html
