Federal prosecutors are seeking 33-year prison terms for Henry “Enrique” Tarrio, the former chairman of the far-right Proud Boys, and another key leader of the group for their roles in a seditious plot that led to the attack on the US Capitol.
It’s the stiffest sentence sought so far among more than 1,000 criminal cases tied to the attack, which sought to disrupt the peaceful transfer of power on Jan. 6, 2021. The punishment was justified for Tarrio because of his “clear leadership role” organizing Proud Boys and others that day, when he acted as a “general rather than a soldier,” the government said Thursday in a court filing.
Tarrio and three other Proud Boys were convicted in May of a seditious conspiracy for their efforts to prevent Congress from approving the 2020 election win by President Joe Biden, which culminated in a mob of former President Donald Trump’s supporters storming the Capitol.
“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,” prosecutors said. “The foot soldiers of the right aimed to keep their leader in power. They failed. They are not heroes; they are criminals.”
Read More: How Seditious Conspiracy Figures Into the Jan. 6 Riot
Prosecutors also requested 33 years for Joseph Biggs, another high-ranking Proud Boys member convicted in the same jury trial as Tarrio. For other defendants, the government sought a 30-year sentence for Zachary Rehl, 27 years for Ethan Nordean, and 20 years for Dominic Pezzola, according to the filing.
In a separate filing Friday, Tarrio’s attorneys urged a lesser punishment, saying the government wasn’t justified in requesting a terrorism enhancement for a charge related to destruction of government property. Such an enhancement would boost Tarrio’s recommended sentence from 14 years to 30 years, they said.
While Tarrio’s crimes were “serious in nature, they are nowhere near and should not be grouped in the same category or considered to be the same caliber as the heinous acts committed by individuals” including Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh or al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, defense lawyers said.
So far, the longest sentence handed down was by US District Judge Amit Mehta, who ordered Stewart Rhodes, the leader of the right-wing Oath Keepers group, to serve 18 years in prison.
Tarrio never actually set foot on the Capitol that day. He’d been arrested earlier for burning a Black Lives Matter flag during a protest march and was ordered to leave town. But prosecutors said his absence didn’t “detract from the severity of his conduct” because Tarrio communicated with the other defendants who entered the Capitol.
“Proud Of My Boys and my country,” Tarrio wrote in a social media post at the time.
Read More: Proud Boys Leaders Convicted of Seditious Plot Over Jan. 6
The case is US v. Nordean et al, 21-cr-00175, US District Court, District of Columbia (Washington).
(Updates with sentencing request by Tarrio.)
