A Marine who stormed the US Capitol and apparently flashed a Nazi salute in entrance of the constructing was sentenced on Friday to almost 5 years in jail.
Tyler Bradley Dykes, of South Carolina, was an active-duty US marine when he grabbed a police riot protect from the fingers of two cops and used it to push his approach via police strains through the assault by a mob of Donald Trump’s supporters on 6 January 2021.
Dykes, who pleaded responsible in April to assault fees, was beforehand convicted of a criminal offense stemming from the 2017 white nationalist Unite the Proper rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. Dykes was transferred to federal custody in 2023 after he served a six-month sentence in a state jail.
US district decide Beryl Howell sentenced Dykes, 26, to 4 years and 9 months of imprisonment, the justice division mentioned.
Federal prosecutors had really useful a jail sentence of 5 years and three months for Dykes.
“He immediately contributed to among the most excessive violence on the Capitol’s east entrance,” prosecutors wrote.
Dykes’ attorneys requested a two-year jail sentence. They mentioned Dykes is aware of his actions on January 6 had been “unlawful, indefensible and insupportable”.
In the course of the sentencing listening to, Dykes mentioned that he nonetheless stood with Trump and that he helps him “to be the subsequent president of our nation”.
“Tyler hates his involvement within the Capitol riot,” his attorneys wrote. “He takes full duty for his actions. Tyler apologizes for these actions.”
Dykes, then 22, traveled to Washington to attend the Republican Trump’s “Cease the Steal” rally with two pals from his hometown of Bluffton, South Carolina. After parting methods along with his pals, Dykes ripped snow fencing out of the bottom and pulled apart bicycle rack barricades as he approached the Capitol.
Later, Dykes joined different rioters in breaking via a line of cops who had been defending the steps resulting in the Capitol’s East Rotunda doorways.
“After reaching the highest of the steps, Dykes celebrated his accomplishment, performing what seems to be the ‘Sieg Heil’ salute,” prosecutors wrote.
After stealing the riot protect from the 2 officers, Dykes entered the Capitol and held it in a single hand whereas he raised his different hand in celebration. He additionally used the protect to assault cops contained in the constructing, forcing them to retreat down a hallway, prosecutors mentioned.
Dykes gave the protect to an officer after he left the Capitol.
Dykes denied that he carried out a Nazi salute on 6 January, however prosecutors say his open-handed gesture was captured on video.
In August 2017, pictures captured Dykes becoming a member of tiki torch-toting white supremacists on a march via the College of Virginia’s campus on the eve of the Unite the Proper rally. A photograph exhibits him extending his proper arm in a Nazi salute and carrying a lit torch in his left hand.
In March 2023, Dykes was arrested on fees associated to the march. He pleaded responsible to a felony cost of burning an object with intent to intimidate.
Dykes briefly attended Cornell College within the fall of 2017 earlier than he joined the US Marine Corps. In Might 2023, he was discharged from the army below “apart from honorable” circumstances.
“Somewhat than honor his oath to guard and defend the structure, Dykes’s legal exercise on January 6 exhibits he was as a substitute selecting to violate it,” prosecutors wrote.
Greater than 1,400 folks have been charged with federal crimes associated to the Capitol riot.
Greater than 900 of them have been sentenced, with roughly two-thirds receiving phrases of imprisonment starting from a couple of days to 22 years.
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