A former U.S. Marine who served within the Trump administration as a low-level State Division aide was sentenced on Friday to almost six years in jail for his function within the assault on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
The previous aide, Federico G. Klein, of Falls Church, Va., was a State Division worker when he used a stolen riot defend to repeatedly assault officers throughout a number of violent clashes in a tunnel beneath the Capitol, prosecutors stated.
He was arrested in March 2021 and indicted later that 12 months.
After a non-jury trial in July, Mr. Klein was convicted of eight felony fees, together with six counts of assaulting, resisting, or impeding officers; obstruction of an official continuing; and civil dysfunction, in addition to a number of misdemeanors, prosecutors stated.
He didn’t testify at his trial, and declined to handle the courtroom earlier than Decide Trevor N. McFadden of the U.S. District Courtroom for the District of Columbia sentenced him to 70 months in jail and 24 months of supervised launch, The Associated Press reported.
“Your actions on Jan. 6 have been stunning and egregious,” Decide McFadden instructed Mr. Klein, 45, based on The A.P.
Prosecutors had requested for 10 years in jail and three years of supervised launch.
They didn’t instantly remark after the sentencing however had argued that Mr. Klein’s place within the State Division made his actions on Jan. 6 significantly appalling.
“As an worker of the federal authorities, Klein was endowed with the belief of the American folks,” they wrote in courtroom paperwork. “He violated that belief on Jan. 6 when he attacked the very nation for which he was paid to work.”
Mr. Klein’s lawyer, Stanley E. Woodward Jr., had requested for 40 days in jail, with credit score for time served, and three years of probation.
Mr. Woodward declined to remark after the sentencing. He had argued that Mr. Klein’s sentence must be primarily based on his actions and never on his standing as a State Division worker.
In courtroom paperwork, Mr. Woodward wrote: “Mr. Klein readily admits that the occasions of Jan. 6, 2021, are abhorrent. Mr. Klein regrets his function within the occasions of that day.”
Mr. Klein, who goes by Freddie, grew up in a suburb of Washington, D.C., attended George Mason College and served within the Marines for about 9 years. He volunteered for mainstream Republicans, together with Mitt Romney in his 2012 presidential marketing campaign, earlier than signing on with Donald J. Trump’s 2016 presidential marketing campaign.
In 2017, he was put in within the State Division’s Workplace of Brazilian and Southern Cone Affairs as a particular assistant, a comparatively obscure place with little affect.
Individuals who encountered him at work stated he was outspoken in his opposition to abortion rights and assist for Mr. Trump’s plans to construct a wall alongside the U.S. border with Mexico.
After the 2020 presidential election, Mr. Klein took day off from the State Division and traveled to Las Vegas, the place he “investigated claims of voter fraud,” prosecutors stated.
When an acquaintance requested him if he was going to Mr. Trump’s “Cease the Steal” rally in Washington on Jan. 6, 2021, Mr. Klein responded in a collection of messages: “Hell yea I’m going. I’m a appointee. I’d higher be there. It IS my job,” prosecutors stated.
Mr. Klein, sporting a purple “Make America Nice Once more” hat, attended the rally after which marched to the Capitol, the place he waged a “relentless siege” on the police for greater than 90 minutes, prosecutors wrote.
They wrote that he “was doubtless motivated by a private profit — specifically, continued employment as a political appointee — when he attacked the U.S. Capitol.”
Ignoring police instructions to maneuver again on the Higher West Plaza, prosecutors stated Mr. Klein “pushed onerous” in opposition to cops, telling them, “You may’t cease this!”
When an officer used a baton to attempt to push him again, Mr. Klein, “pressed again in opposition to him, driving his left shoulder” into the officer, prosecutors wrote.
“We want some extra, let’s go!” Mr. Klein instructed rioters, based on prosecutors.
Mr. Klein then entered a tunnel within the first wave of rioters, beckoning others to hitch him, prosecutors stated.
When officers contained in the tunnel tried to shut a set of steel doorways, Mr. Klein grabbed a stolen riot defend and, with the assistance of one other rioter, efficiently wedged it between the doorways, prosecutors stated.
He and different rioters then pried open the doorways and continued to assault the police, prosecutors wrote.
At one level, a rioter handed Mr. Klein a stolen riot defend, which Mr. Klein used to “forcibly push” in opposition to officers, as rioters round him chanted “Heave! Ho!”
Mr. Klein “pushed so forcefully,” urgent his face and physique in opposition to riot shields, that one officer who was making an attempt to carry again the mob exclaimed, “I’m exhausted!”
“Regardless of Klein’s and different rioters’ appreciable and coordinated efforts,” prosecutors wrote, “the police line on the tunnel didn’t fail.”
