A Texas man who was the first rioter to go on trial for the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol was resentenced on Friday to nearly seven years in prison after he delivered an angry, profane rant to the judge who agreed to modestly reduce his original sentence.
Guy Reffitt benefitted from a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that led to the dismissal of his conviction on an obstruction charge. His new sentence — six years and eight months — is seven months lower than his original sentence.
Reffitt repeatedly shook his head and appeared to be agitated as he listened to U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich and a prosecutor describe his role in a mob's attack on the Capitol. He told the judge that he was “in my feelings” and upset about the “lies and the craziness” that he perceived.
“I was not there to take over no government,” Reffitt said. “I love this country.”
“No one has a problem with your feelings,” the judge said. “It's the actions you took with your feelings.”
Reffitt stormed the Capitol with a holstered handgun on his waist. He also was carrying zip-tie handcuffs and wearing body armor and a helmet equipped with a video camera when he advanced on police officers outside the building. He retreated after an officer pepper sprayed him in the face, but he waved on other rioters who ultimately breached the building.
Prosecutors said Reffitt told fellow members of the Texas Three Percenters militia group that he planned to drag House Speaker Nancy Pelosi out of the Capitol building by her ankles, “with her head hitting every step on the way down.”
“His objective was to overtake Congress, physically and with violence,” said Assistant U.S. Attorney Jeffrey Nestler.
“In his own words,” Nestler added, “Congress was the demon and he was going to cut the head off the demon.”
Reffitt is one of several Jan. 6 defendants to be resentenced after a Supreme Court ruling in June limited the government’s use of a federal obstruction law. The high court ruled 6-3 that a charge of obstructing an official proceeding must include proof that a defendant tried to tamper with or destroy documents — a distinction that applies to few Jan. 6 criminal cases.
A jury convicted Reffitt of four other counts, including a charge that he threatened his two teenage children after returning to their in home in Wylie, Texas, after the riot. Reffitt’s son Jackson, then 19, testified that his father told him and his younger sister, then 16, that they would be traitors if they reported him to authorities and warned them that “traitors get shot.”
Reffitt's two daughters spoke favorably of their father during his resentencing. They described him as a caring father who doesn't pose a danger to anybody.
Prosecutors said Reffitt’s recent communications from jail indicate that he “views his imprisonment as an injustice and as part of a greater cause, and that he maintains pride in actions on January 6 and his involvement in the community of those who he believes have been wrongly prosecuted for their crimes on that day.”
More than 1,500 people have been charged with Capitol riot-related crimes. About 1,000 of them have pleaded guilty. Roughly 250 others have been convicted by a judge or jury after a trial.
