Man who stormed Capitol in caveman costume gets prison

A New York Metropolis decide’s son who stormed the U.S. Capitol wearing a furry “caveman” costume was sentenced on Friday to eight months in jail.

U.S. District Choose James Boasberg stated Aaron Mostofsky was “actually on the front traces” of the mob’s attack on Jan. 6, 2021.

“What you and others did on that day imposed an indelible stain on how our nation is perceived, both at dwelling and overseas, and that can’t be undone,” the judge told Mostofsky, 35.

Boasberg additionally sentenced Mostofsky to 1 yr of supervised release and ordered him to carry out 200 hours of community service and pay $2,000 in restitution.

Mostofsky had requested the choose for mercy, saying he was ashamed of his “contribution to the chaos of that day.”

“I feel sorry for the officers that needed to cope with that chaos,” said Mostofsky, who should report back to jail in roughly one month.

Mostofsky was carrying a strolling stick and dressed in a furry costume when he joined the mob that attacked the Capitol. He told a good friend that the costume expressed his perception that “even a caveman” would know that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from former President Donald Trump.

Additionally on Friday, a federal decide agreed to postpone a trial in July for members of the far-right Oath Keepers militia group charged with conspiring to forcefully halt the peaceable transfer of power after President Joe Biden’s 2020 electoral victory.

A primary jury trial for five of nine Oath Keepers members charged with seditious conspiracy, including group founder Stewart Rhodes, is now scheduled to start out on Sept. 26 and is expected to final a couple of month. A second trial for the other four defendants is scheduled to begin on Nov. 29.

U.S. District Decide Amit Mehta agreed to offer protection legal professionals more time to organize for trial but indicated that he isn’t inclined to grant one other delay. Just a few defense attorneys expressed concern about the potential impact if a congressional panel investigating the Jan. 6 riot releases its report across the same time as the primary trial. Mehta said that wouldn’t be a cause for an additional delay, “even when 435 members of Congress start studying from the report on the courthouse steps.”

More than 780 folks have been charged with federal crimes related to the Capitol riot. Over 280 of them have pleaded guilty, largely to misdemeanors.

A Tennessee man, Albuquerque Head, pleaded responsible on Friday to assaulting Metropolitan Police Department Officer Michael Fanone. Head pulled Fanone right into a crowd of rioters who beat him, shocked him with a stun gun and stole his badge and police radio. An Iowa man, Kyle Younger, pleaded guilty on Thursday to assaulting Fanone, who was seriously injured by rioters and has since testified before Congress in regards to the attack.

More than 160 defendants have been sentenced, including over 60 who have been sentenced to terms of imprisonment ranging from 14 days to 5 years and three months.

In Mostofsky’s case, federal sentencing pointers recommended a jail sentence starting from 10 months to 16 months. Prosecutors really useful a sentence of 15 months in jail followed by three years of supervised launch.

Mostofsky was one of the first rioters to enter the restricted area around the Capitol and among the first to breach the constructing itself, by the Senate Wing doorways, in response to prosecutors. He pushed towards a police barrier that officers were trying to move and stole a Capitol Police bulletproof vest and riot defend, prosecutors said.

“Mostofsky cheered on other rioters as they clashed with police outside the Capitol constructing, even celebrating with a fist-bump to one of his fellow rioters,” prosecutors wrote in a court filing.

Inside the constructing, Mostofsky adopted rioters who chased Capitol Police Officer Eugene Goodman up a staircase toward the Senate chambers. He took the police vest and shield with him when he left the Capitol, about 20 minutes after entering.

Mostofsky steadily wears costumes at occasions, in keeping with his legal professionals.

“To put the matter with understatement, the New Yorker is quirky even by the requirements of his residence metropolis,” they wrote.

A New York Post reporter interviewed him inside the Capitol during the riot. He informed the reporter that he stormed the Capitol because “the election was stolen.”

Mostofsky has labored as an assistant architect in New York. His father, Steven Mostofsky, is a state court docket judge in Brooklyn.

“The truth that his father is a choose signifies that he ought to have been higher able than different defendants to understand why the claims of election fraud have been false,” mentioned Justice Department prosecutor Michael Romano.

Boasberg stated not one of the supportive letters submitted by Mostofsky’s household and friends explain how he “went down this rabbit hole of election fantasy.”

“I hope at this point you understand that your indulgence in that fantasy has led to this tragic situation,” the judge added.

Aaron Mostofsky pleaded responsible in February to a felony cost of civil disorder and misdemeanor fees of theft of government property and entering and remaining in a restricted building or grounds. Mostofsky was the primary Capitol rioter to be sentenced for a civil disorder conviction.

Mostofsky’s attorneys asked for a sentence of house confinement, probation and neighborhood service. Defense legal professional Nicholas Smith described Mostofsky as a “spectator” who “drifted with the gang” and didn’t go to the Capitol to intrude with the peaceable transfer of energy.

“He did issues he mustn't have carried out,” Smith said. “But there’s a big distinction between an ideologue who's motivated to commit violence and someone who finally ends up doing unhealthy things after they find” themselves in a crowd.