WASHINGTON — A Tennessee bartender who carried plastic zip tie handcuffs and a stun gun into the Senate gallery on Jan. 6, 2021, the place he was captured in a single essentially the most broadly shared pictures of the U.S. Capitol riot, was sentenced on Friday to just about 5 years in jail.
Eric Munchel, 32, was convicted of conspiracy and different costs alongside his mom, Lisa Eisenhart, 59, who was additionally sentenced on Friday to two-and-a-half years in jail.
The picture that went viral after the riot reveals Munchel, who was dressed like a member of a SWAT workforce, leaping over a railing within the Senate gallery with a handful of zip-tie handcuffs in his hand. Lawmakers getting ready to certify President Joe Biden’s 2020 electoral victory had fled the Senate ground solely minutes earlier than rioters invaded the chamber.
“A photojournalist captured the moment in what has become an iconic picture from January 6, visually capturing the danger of the riot, to democracy in general and to our elected representatives in particular,” prosecutors wrote in a courtroom submitting. “Due to this photograph, Munchel is widely known on social media as ‘Zip Tie Guy.’”
Prosecutors added that “it is terrifying to contemplate what Munchel and Eisenhart would have done if members of Congress had still been present in the Senate Chamber when they entered it.”
U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth, who sentenced the pair, determined their case and not using a jury after a “stipulated bench trial.” That means the choose primarily based his rulings on info that either side agreed to earlier than the trial began. The continuing permits defendants to protect enchantment rights that they must waive in the event that they pleaded responsible.
Prosecutors had really helpful jail sentences of 4 years and 9 months for Munchel and three years and 10 months for Eisenhart, of Woodstock Georgia, who has labored as a nurse for over 30 years. Munchel was sentenced to 4 years and 9 months behind bars.
Munchel and his mom traveled from Nashville, Tennessee, to Washington, D.C., two days earlier than then-President Donald Trump’s Jan. 6 “Stop the Steal” rally close to the White House.
Both of them wore tactical vests as they walked from their resort to affix the Capitol siege, which disrupted the joint session of Congress for certifying President Joe Biden’s electoral victory. Munchel additionally wore all-black paramilitary garb with a stun gun holstered on his hip.
Munchel bumped fists with a member of the anti-government Oath Keepers extremist group earlier than he and his mom entered the Capitol via an emergency exit door. Inside, Munhel stole zip-tie handcuffs from a shelf and handed one to his mom.
Eisenhart shouted, “Treason!” and “Cowards!” whereas she and her son stood within the Senate gallery, about half-hour after lawmakers fled the chamber. Munchel was carrying a handful of zip-tie cuffs as he leaped over a banister within the gallery.
Munchel was “ready to take hostages,” and his mom was ready to assist him and “show Congress who was really in charge,” prosecutors mentioned.
“The logical inference is that Munchel and Eisenhart wanted to use the zip tie handcuffs to capture their enemies: the members of Congress voting to certify the election.”
Munchel and his mom solely spent about 12 minutes contained in the Capitol, however they managed to penetrate and occupy “one of the most sensitive and sacred areas of the Capitol,” prosecutors mentioned.
Four days after the riot, FBI brokers arrested Munchel, searched his residence and seized zip ties matching these he stole on the Capitol. Einsenhart was arrested 10 days after the riot. Both of them remained jailed for over two months after their arrests.
Defense lawyer Joseph Allen mentioned Munchel went to Washington “to protest what he was convinced was an unlawful and corrupt election result.”
“Mr. Munchel is not a rioter nor is he an insurrectionist. He was and is a law-abiding citizen who found himself caught up in the events of a day which began lawfully and peacefully and then devolved into the situation in which he finds himself now,” Allen wrote in sentencing memo.
Einsenhart’s lawyer, Gregory Smith, mentioned she and her son by no means threatened to make use of the zip ties or to seize any members of Congress.
“The government’s entire argument here is built on inferences and assumptions, which is not enough to meet their burden,” Smith wrote in a courtroom submitting.
More than 1,100 folks have been charged with federal crimes associated to the Capitol riot. More than 600 of them have been sentenced, with roughly 400 receiving phrases of imprisonment starting from three days to 22 years, in accordance with an Associated Press evaluate of courtroom information.
Also this week, a person related to the Kansas City chapter of the Proud Boys extremist group pleaded responsible to a felony cost of obstructing regulation enforcement throughout a civil dysfunction. Christopher Kuehne, 50, of Olathe, Kansas, marched to the Capitol with a big group of Proud Boys. After getting into the constructing, prosecutors say he made his approach to the Crypt, the place he and others moved a conveyable lectern to dam a door from closing.
An electronic mail searching for remark was despatched to Kuehne’s lawyer on Friday.
• Associated Press reporter Alanna Durkin Richer contributed from Boston.
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