Washington – The New Jersey man who admitted to spraying U.S. Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick with pepper spray in the course of the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack was sentenced to 80 months in jail on Friday in a Washington, D.C. courtroom full of Sicknick’s colleagues and fellow officers.
“I do not know what acquired into you,” mentioned federal Decide Thomas Hogan, as he imposed the yearslong jail sentence on Julian Khater, “in some way you bought decided to push your manner by means of the group.”
Hogan additionally fined Khater $10,000.
Sicknick died of natural causes a day after defending the Capitol in the course of the Jan. 6 assault, the D.C. health worker’s workplace introduced final 12 months. He suffered strokes, with a health worker’s report abstract citing “acute brainstem and cerebellar infarcts resulting from acute basilar artery thrombosis.”
Friday’s sentencing listening to drew busloads of different U.S. Capitol Cops who needed to honor their fallen colleague.
Based on courtroom paperwork and Julian Khater’s plea settlement, he and codefendant George Tanios — who pleaded responsible to lesser costs — traveled to Washington, D.C. from West Virginia to attend former President Donald Trump’s rally on the White Home Ellipse.
The pair moved from the rally grounds towards the Capitol, though investigators say they uncovered no proof that the boys deliberate on rioting that day.
“Surveillance video exhibits Khater reaching inside Tanios’ backpack and retrieving one of many canisters of chemical spray they’d dropped at Washington,” the federal government pre-sentencing memo alleged, describing Khater as offended, emotional, and uncontrolled.
After making his strategy to the entrance of the mob on the Capitol’s decrease west aspect, prosecutors say Khater aimed the pepper spray at a line of officers.
Division of Justice
“Khater’s assault, together with assaults from a whole lot of different rioters, resulted within the collapse of the police line,” the federal government wrote, “Khater’s first sufferer was United States Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick.”
Bodycam and surveillance video reviewed by CBS Information and photos included in courtroom paperwork present Sicknick reacting to an irritant, recoiling, and clearing the realm to wipe his eyes and clear his face. Different officers had been additionally hit with Khater’s pepper spray and tried to protect themselves from its results, the movies present.
Neither Khater nor Tanios have been charged in Sicknick’s demise.
Division of Justice
Urging the decide to condemn Khater to 90 months in jail, prosecutors wrote, “Whereas Julian Khater’s spray assault on Officer Sicknick finally was not decided to be the direct explanation for his demise, Workplace Sicknick’s tragic demise, so shut in time to the traumatic occasions of that day, underscores the seriousness of the offense dedicated by Khater and his fellow rioters.”
He “dedicated a cowardly and premeditated assault on at the least three uniformed regulation enforcement officers,” the federal government mentioned throughout Friday’s proceedings, exhibiting the courtroom video of Khater’s varied actions in the course of the assault.
And though Khater didn’t himself enter the Capitol that day, the federal government advised Hogan that he was a significant a part of the mob that broke down the obstacles and “allowed” the breach of the Capitol.
Khater — who has been incarcerated since his arrest in March 2021 — requested for leniency, his attorneys writing earlier than sentencing that he “feels real regret for his conduct.”
Describing their shopper as a delicate and type particular person who was swept up within the mob mentality of the day, Khater’s protection group argued he and Tanios traveled to the nation’s capital for the only objective of attending the Trump rally. Tanios, they mentioned, solely introduced the pepper spray used within the assault to defend them towards potential violence that day, not assault.
Khater’s regrettable actions, they wrote, “had been certainly remoted and never a part of some coordinated effort.”
His protection group requested Hogan for a sentence of time served, citing in authorized briefs what they described as suboptimal and dehumanizing situations in custody which embrace poor meals and sleep deprivation.
In courtroom on Friday, Khater’s protection lawyer mentioned, “the conduct on this case doesn’t outline him,” and cited his shopper’s historical past of crippling nervousness and melancholy.
“Regardless of a few of the hyperbole and rhetoric,” the protection argued Friday, “Mr. Khater didn’t immediately or not directly” result in Sicknick’s demise.
Khater himself additionally briefly spoke on Friday, describing the final two years as humbling, but “agonizing.”
“I can guarantee you,” he mentioned to the decide, “what transpired that day was not in my nature … won’t ever occur once more.”
Hogan famous he didn’t hear any sorrow or remorse from Khater about what he did to the officers that day. Khater responded that he averted doing so due to an ongoing civil case on the matter.
For his half, Tanios already pleaded responsible to lesser courts on unlawful entry and disorderly conduct and was sentenced to time served with one 12 months of supervised launch. He admitted to encouraging rioters, videotaping assaults on regulation enforcement and shopping for the cans of spray chemical compounds used that day.
Forward of sentencing, Sicknick’s mom and siblings submitted letters to the courtroom, describing emotions of anger towards Khater. Additionally they spoke emotionally in courtroom on Friday about their loss.
“You attacked my son like he was an animal; you’re the animal, Mr. Khater,” Sicknick’s mom, Gladys, wrote, “It’s best to have recognized higher… on this nice nation, we go to the voting sales space to make a distinction. We do not begin an armed rise up, regardless of the President inspired you to ‘struggle like Hell’.”
Wearing her deceased son’s shirt, Gladys Sicknick addressed Khater throughout Friday’s proceedings. “You attacked my son like he was an animal. You’re the animal, Mr. Khater,” she mentioned, emotionally. “How does it really feel to be headed to jail due to a bald-faced lie?”
Sicknick’s longtime associate, Santa Garza, mentioned Khater and Tanios had been “brainwashed” by Trump.
Decide Hogan was cautious to level out that he was not sentencing Khater for Sicknick’s demise, emphasizing that such a cost was not in entrance of him on Friday. Nonetheless, the decide mentioned he discovered no excuse for the actions that day.
