An admitted participant in the mob assault on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, was sentenced to 20 months in prison after admitting to two felony charges stemming from the day’s events, including civil disorder and assaulting, resisting, or impeding police officers.
Presumably (considering precedent in Capitol riot cases), the guilty plea from defendant Joseph Robert Fisher helped the Massachusetts man secure a prison sentence not even reaching two years. The assault charge alone can — in some iterations — come with up to 20 years in prison if the defendant’s found guilty. In general, rioters’ eventual sentences have easily reached additional years in length.
Fisher’s assault of an officer reported by federal authorities in a press release took place inside of the U.S. Capitol building as the targeted officer apparently attempted to apprehend another member of the crowd who had sprayed a chemical irritant. Fisher reportedly waited as the officer and rioter ran his direction and then shoved a chair into the law enforcement figure, abruptly cutting off the pursuit as another member of the crowd joined the assault.
Just “as the officer and a rioter ran by, Fisher rammed the chair into the officer, preventing the officer from apprehending the rioter. Fisher continued to assault the officer by grabbing and pushing the officer as another rioter hit and shoved the officer from behind,” said that federal press release.
Fisher himself is a retired police officer with the Boston Police Department, and his consequences also include two years of supervised release that will come after his time in prison and $2,000 in restitutive financial penalties.
Continuing to hang over all of these Capitol riot cases is the repeated proposal from presumptive GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump for presidential pardons and other help for Capitol riot defendants if he wins in 2024.
