The rioters of the January 6, 2021 attack on the United States Capitol in Washington are sanctioned one after the other. This Monday, one of them was given the heaviest sentence since the start of the trial.
With our correspondent in Washington, Guillaume Naudin
Guy Reffitt will remain 87 months, more than seven years in prison. It must be said that this 49-year-old man is not just anyone. Member and even recruiter of a far-right militia, Three Percenters, on January 6, he had come by road from his home in Texas to Washington. At the head of the first group to attack the headquarters of Congress, he had helped to force the police lines, equipped according to the prosecutors with a handgun, a bulletproof vest, a helmet and plastic handcuffs.
During the riot and the attack, with his camera, he recorded a particularly violent speech which he never regretted until the moment of the judgment on Monday, when he described himself as an idiot with mental health issues. On the contrary, throughout his preventive detention, Guy Reffitt multiplied extremist political diatribes. When he returned to Wylie, near Dallas, he had threatened his two children to prevent them from reporting him to the police. “ The traitors, we kill them “, he said on a recorded conversation and transmitted to the FBI by his 19-year-old son, Jackson.
The sentence could have been even heavier, but the judge, appointed by Donald Trump, rejected the terrorist dimension of the crimes put forward by the prosecution. Although he did not enter the Capitol, prosecutors accuse Guy Reffitt of being one of the leaders of the riot. ” Fake “, said his daughter at the end of the judgment. It was not my father’s name that was on the flags that day but someone else’s, she explained. An allusion to Donald Trump who has so far still not been prosecuted. In parallel with this judicial component, a parliamentary commission of inquiry seeks to shed light on former president’s role in attack. Its report is expected in the fall.
Since the attack, more than 850 people have been arrested, 330 have pleaded guilty and only a dozen have been tried at trial. So far, around 100 prison sentences have been handed down.