Newly Released Clip Shows Massive Trump Flag Used as ‘Battering Ram’ to Attack Police on Jan. 6
As several trials and sentencing hearings for Jan. 6 rioters took place this week, new details and video footage from the day of the attack have emerged.
Among those new details is a video showing a giant Trump banner being used as a “battering ram against police” by pro-Trump rioters attempting to break police lines to enter the U.S. Capitol that day.
NBC News justice correspondent Ryan J. Reilly shared the shocking images on Twitter Wednesday, noting, “Newly released Jan. 6 body-worn camera footage shows the mob using an enormous TRUMP sign as a battering ram against police.”
Newly released Jan. 6 body-worn camera footage shows the mob using an enormous TRUMP sign as a battering ram against police. pic.twitter.com/8pPMupf2cn
— Ryan J. Reilly (@ryanjreilly) September 28, 2022
Reilly explained that the footage “was released in connection with the sentencing of Howard Richardson.” Richardson, 72, was sentenced in late August to 46 months in prison for attacking law enforcement officers with a Trump flag and for his role in helping the mob use the large Trump banner to ram police as well.
“Richardson also wrongly insisted that he carried a ‘Back the Blue’ flag on January 6 and not a Trump flag,” federal prosecutors said in their appeal to the judge seeking 46 months of incarceration for Richardson.
“Apparently unphased [sic] by the irony of using a pro-police symbol to attack a police officer, Richardson made this assertion even though the video footage clearly shows his flag is a blue and red ‘Trump’ flag,” the government added. Reilly shared the clip of Richardson hitting law enforcement with the Trump flag on social media as well.
Another angle of the attack with the enormous TRUMP sign: pic.twitter.com/jIOhfXFFv7
— Ryan J. Reilly (@ryanjreilly) September 28, 2022
Stewart Rhodes, the founder of the militia group the Oath Keepers, is on trial this week on charges including seditious conspiracy over his role in the attack on the Capitol and attempt to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s presidential victory.
“The stakes are high for the Justice Department, which hasn’t tried a seditious conspiracy case in a decade and hasn’t won a guilty verdict since the 1995 prosecution of Islamic militants who plotted to bomb New York City landmarks,” the Associated Press notes of the landmark trial likely to yield more revelations about the event surrounding Jan. 6.
Logan Barnhart, a bodybuilder and romance novel cover model, pleaded guilty on Wednesday for his role in the attack on the Capitol. Barnhart admitted “he battled cops and helped drag an officer down the stairs on the western front where some of the most barbaric violence of the day took place,” reported Reilly on the days events.
BREAKING: Bodybuilder and romance novel cover model Logan Barnhart has pleaded guilty, admitting that he helped drag a cop down the stairs of the Capitol facedown on Jan. 6. #Catsweat https://t.co/4OWISoJlp3
— Ryan J. Reilly (@ryanjreilly) September 28, 2022
