Federal prosecutors on Sunday advised a jail sentence of about four yrs for a Pennsylvania person who pleaded guilty to assaulting an Associated Press photographer and employing a stun gun against law enforcement officers for the duration of a mob’s attack on the U.S. Capitol.
U.S. District Choose Randolph Moss is scheduled to sentence Alan Byerly on Oct. 21 for his attack on AP photographer John Minchillo and law enforcement through the Jan. 6, 2021 riot in Washington, D.C.
Sentencing recommendations advise a jail phrase ranging from 37 to 46 months. Prosecutors are searching for a sentence of at the very least 46 months of imprisonment adopted by 3 several years of supervised release. Byerly’s lawyer has until finally Friday to post a sentencing recommendation.
The decide isn’t certain by any of the sentencing suggestions.
Byerly was arrested in July 2021 and pleaded responsible a 12 months afterwards to assault fees.
Byerly obtained a stun gun right before he traveled from his house in Fleetwood, Pennsylvania, to Washington for the “Stop the Steal” rally on Jan. 6. Leaving the rally prior to then-President Donald Trump finished speaking, Byerly went to the Capitol and joined other rioters in applying a substantial metallic Trump indicator as a battering ram from barricades and law enforcement officers, prosecutors said.
Then he went to the Capitol’s Lessen West Terrace of the Capitol, in which he and other rioters attacked Minchillo, who was putting on a lanyard with AP lettering. Byerly is one particular of at least 3 folks charged with assaulting Minchillo, whose assault was captured on online video by a colleague.
Soon after that, Byerly approached law enforcement officer driving bicycle racks and deployed his stun gun.
“After officers effectively eradicated the stun gun from Byerly’s arms, Byerly ongoing to charge towards the officers, struck and pushed them, and grabbed an officer’s baton,” prosecutors wrote.
Byerly later on advised FBI brokers that he did just “one stupid matter down there and which is all it was,” according to prosecutors.
“This was a reference to how he taken care of the reporter and practically nothing extra,” they wrote.
Byerly treated Jan. 6 “as a standard, criminal offense-absolutely free working day, akin to the movie, ‘The Purge,’ when he could do whatever he preferred with out judgment or lawful consequence,” prosecutors claimed.
“He was mistaken,” they extra.
Extra than 100 law enforcement officers had been wounded through the Capitol siege.
Around 900 men and women have been billed with federal crimes for their conduct on Jan. 6. A lot more than 400 of them have pleaded responsible, generally to misdemeanor offenses. Over 280 riot defendants have been sentenced, with approximately half sentenced to phrases of imprisonment ranging from one particular 7 days to 10 several years.
Michael Kunzelman, The Connected Press
