Four members of the Proud Boys, a far-right group, were found guilty of seditious conspiracy for their roles in the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol. The former “national chairman,” Enrique Tarrio, and three of his lieutenants, Joseph Biggs, Ethan Nordean, and Zachary Rehl, were convicted, while a fourth member, Dominic Pezzola, was found not guilty. Tarrio was accused of directing the attack on the Capitol to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s election victory over Donald Trump.
All five Proud Boy defendants were also convicted of several lesser charges, including obstruction of Congress and destruction of government property. Pezzola was additionally found guilty of robbery of US property. The success of federal prosecutors in obtaining seditious conspiracy convictions could raise the stakes for Trump and his aides in the probe by a special counsel into whether they plotted or fomented the Capitol attack.
More than 1,000 people have been arrested in connection with the storming of Congress by Trump supporters, and more than 600 convicted, but only about a dozen have faced the rarely used charge of sedition. Two leaders of another far-right group, the Oath Keepers, were convicted of seditious conspiracy last year.
The assault on Congress left at least five people dead and 140 police officers injured. Trump was impeached for an insurrection but was acquitted by the Senate. A House committee recommended that the Justice Department pursue criminal charges against Trump. Garland named a special counsel to oversee the probe into the January 6 assault and the former president’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election result.
Three weeks before the violence, Trump urged his supporters to descend on Washington on January 6, tweeting: “Be there, will be wild.” Trump is also facing possible indictment in Georgia for allegedly pressuring local officials to change the election results in the southern state. The special counsel is also looking into a cache of classified documents that the FBI seized in a raid on Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence last year.
