WASHINGTON. On the afternoon of January 6, 2021, a man believed by authorities to be a member of the Texas militia walked from the Ellipse in Washington, where President Donald Trump spoke about electoral fraud, to the Capitol. He wore what he called “full combat gear”: body armor, a helmet with a camera, a set of plastic hand ties, and a .40 caliber pistol on his hip.
Over the next few minutes, an armed man, Guy Wesley Refitt, not only helped lead the crowd up the stairs of the building, but also recorded him talking about his role in the offensive, prosecutors said.
“We’ll take the Capitol before the end of the day, pulling them by the hair,” Mr. Reffit said on camera. He then made a specific threat to the Speaker of the House: “I just want to see Nancy Pelosi headbutt every step of the way on her way out.”
Echoing that dramatic scene, prosecutors on Wednesday opened the first criminal trial for the Capitol attack, saying Mr. Reffit was at the forefront of a crowd of Trump supporters that stormed the building as lawmakers certified the results of the 2020 election.
“He planned to light a match that would start a fire,” U.S. Attorney Jeffrey S. Nestler said in his opening statement. “He wanted to stop Congress from doing its job.”
As the lawsuit unfolds over the next few days, the government intends to provide evidence that Mr. Refitt, 41, had a confrontation with police outside the Capitol following a trip to Washington from his home in Wylie, Texas. Prosecutors say Mr. Reffit came to Washington with another member of the Texas Three Percent, a loosely organized militia movement that takes its name from the alleged 3 percent of the US colonial population who fought against the British.
Mr. Nestler said prosecutors would release messages Mr. Reffit sent to other members of the group before the attack, saying “fuel is ready” and that he plans to “strike a match in D.C. on January 6th.” “. The Three Percent who traveled with him to Washington, Rocky Hardy, is to testify under a immunity agreement with the government.
Prosecutors also plan to take statements from Mr. Refitt’s two children, Jackson and Peyton, who were teenagers at the time of the attack. The kids plan to say that their father threatened them after he returned to Texas to keep them from turning him in to the authorities.
A large, barrel-chested man with a pigtail, Mr. Refitt sat without showing much emotion as Mr. Nestler told the jury how he had led a large group of rioters up the stairs in the Capitol, right in front of the Senate chamber, waving them off. attempts by the police to stop him with pepper balls and heavier projectiles. According to Mr. Nestler, even after he was finally defused with a pepper spray, Mr. Refitt urged the crowd around him to move on.
In his brief opening statement, Mr. Refitt’s lawyer, William L. Welch, downplayed the confrontation with police, saying that his client never attacked the officers or helped anyone attack them. While Mr. Welch acknowledged that Mr. Reffit was prone to “ranting” and “exaggeration,” he insisted that he was not aggressive.
“This case was a hasty decision,” Mr. Welch said, “based on boastfulness, based on a lot of hype.”
The first witness at the trial, Shauni Kerckhoff, a former Capitol police officer, appeared to contradict Mr. Welch’s description of Mr. Refitt. Watching security footage of her confrontation with Mr. Refitt, Ms. Kerckhoff told the jury that after he moved up the stairs towards her, disobeying her commands, she used a Tippmann PepperBall Launcher to fire 40 to 50 rounds.
She remembered that it did little to slow him down. Mr. Refitt was also undeterred by the larger projectiles fired by her partner and the pepper spray used by the third officer.
At that moment, Ms. Kerhoff, in a panic, called for help on the radio.
“We’ve got a man breaking into the west terrace, breaking into the west terrace up the stairs,” she shouted in a breathless message played to the jury. “We need help.”
Guy Wesley Reffit during the 6 January attack. Credit … through the Department of Justice.
After more than 200 guilty pleas in cases related to Jan. 6, Mr. Reffitt’s case is the first to reach the courtroom and marks the first time a jury will consider a legal theory that the government has indicted hundreds of defendants.
At the heart of the case is the allegation that Mr. Reffit interfered with the work of Congress during the attack by helping to kick lawmakers out of the building while they watched the Electoral College vote certify. The charge of obstruction — one of five charges brought against him — was used in place of other crimes such as sedition or rebellion in dozens of Capitol riots to describe the violation that occurred when the mob forced lawmakers to flee.
Capitol Riot Aftermath: Key Events
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Lawyers were called. The House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack subpoenaed half a dozen lawyers and other allies of former President Donald J. Trump who promoted false claims of widespread fraud in the 2020 election and worked to disprove his defeat.
First court. Guy Wesley Reffit, who is accused of obstructing the work of Congress on January 6, became the first defendant to stand trial in a case related to the Capitol riots. The trial, which began on February 28, will set the tone for dozens of other cases.
In the months leading up to the trial, several defense lawyers, including Mr. Refitt’s lawyer, disputed the use of the law, arguing that prosecutors had extended it far beyond its original intent to stop acts such as destroying documents or interfering with Witness testimony to congressional requests. But 10 federal judges, including Judge Dabney L. Friedrich, who oversees Refitt’s trial, supported the application of the law. Mr. Reffitt’s case will be the first time that a jury will decide whether a charge fits the crime.
However, there is one caveat: Judge Friedrich ruled before the court that she herself could drop the obstruction charge if she did not believe the evidence supported the claim that Mr. Reffit acted “corruptly” in disrupting the work of Congress as required. law. charter. Prosecutors will try to convince her – and the jury – that Mr. Reffit did indeed act corruptly, alleging that he intended to attack the police, and perhaps by the way he planned the violence that day.
To this end, Mr. Nestler informed the jury in his opening statement that Mr. Reffit had begun preparations to storm the Capitol long before January 6th. At the end of December, he sent a message to his family members saying “tyranny” and that “what is about to happen will shake the world”.
Mr. Refitt’s son Jackson was so worried that he called the FBI on Christmas Eve 2020 to alert agents about his father — “an agonizing decision,” as Mr. Nestler put it.
In less than two weeks, Mr. Refitt and Mr. Hardy left Texas and drove 2,000 miles across the country to Washington. According to Mr. Nestler, they took a car to bring back a cache of weapons, including the pistol Mr. Reffit was carrying and an assault rifle.