On Friday, A Texas militia member Donald Hazard was sentenced to nearly five years in prison for attacking and seriously injuring a police officer during a mob attack on January 6, 2021, at the U.S. Capitol.
Donald Hazard Attacked Police During U.S. Capitol Riot Last 2021
A spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s office for the District of Columbia claimed that a verdict came after earlier that Donald Hazard, 44 years old was sentenced by US District Judge Randolph Moss to four years and including nine months in prison followed by three months of monitored release for his role in the riot at the Capitol.
Donald Hazard pleaded guilty to assaulting a law enforcer that was charged in February resulting in physical injury connected to the breach of the Capitol on January 6, according to the United States Department Of Justice.
Hazard was from Hurst, Texas, and was a member of a militia named the Patriot Boys of North Texas. While Lucas Denney was the Patriot Boys of North Texas’s president, appointed Hazard as its sergeant-at-arms of their organization and encourage Hazard to gear up and put on some protective gear and recruit others to join them in the Capitol riot prosecutors said.
Donald Hazard was really on the mode for violence that day of the riot, he even wears a tactical vest and a helmet decorated with the image of the Confederate battle flag, Justice Department prosecutor Benet Kearney wrote in a court filing.
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January 6, 2021, U.S. Capitol Riot Incident
During the mob just after marching to Capitol, Donald Hazard tracked officers who were trying to hold off the mob around scaffolding on the northwest side of the Capitol building. However, Hazard takes grabs the Capitol police officer and drags him down to a set of concrete steps which causes the officer to hit and leads to unconsciousness. The officer was treated for trauma and foot injuries that required multiple surgeries.
Furthermore, Hazard also fell on another Capitol police officer whose head hit the concrete. Hazard and Denney, both exerting what seemed to be canisters of pepper spray, encountered other police on the west side of the US Capitol.
AP News reported that Hazard entered the Capitol before police forced him to move away and other rebels out of the Capitol but was Hazard persistent and successfully reached the Capitol’s exterior steps, Hazard lifted his arms in a gesture of his victory.
After that incident, Hazard even brags on Facebook about his actions at the Capitol and fighting with police.
Donald Hazard’s Attorney Defended Him
Defense attorney Ubong Akpan defended Hazard saying that he has no intentions of attacking officers and Hazard’s action was more of a reaction to what he must do base on what he witnessed on that day, as opposed to a plan to attack law enforcement, a group he thought he was similarly situated with.
A video was provided by Akpan implying that Hazard did not attempt to attack the officers in the scaffolding, Akpan argued. But still, Hazard was detained and charged together with Denney, who also pleaded guilty to an assault charge and was sentenced last September to four years and four months in jail.
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