A Kentucky man who was the first rioter to enter the US Capitol during Donald Trump supporters’ attack on Congress on January 6, 2021, was sentenced to 53 months in prison on Tuesday. Michael Sparks, 46, a factory supervisor, was found guilty in March of civil disorder and disorderly and disruptive behaviour in a restricted building.
Prosecutors had sought a sentence of 57 months while Sparks’s defense team urged that he be given 12 months of home detention. District Judge Timothy Kelly sentenced Sparks to 53 months in prison and a $2,000 fine.
In their sentencing brief, prosecutors stated that Sparks was “the very first rioter to enter the United States Capitol building” and “helped light the fire that day.” Sparks jumped through a smashed window, they claimed, “ignoring the warnings of the rioters behind him and the pepper spray (from US Capitol police) that hit him squarely in the face.”
Capitol police sergeant Victor Nichols, testifying at Sparks’ trial in Washington, stated that he “acted like a green light for everybody behind him, and everyone followed right behind him.” Nearly 1,500 people have been charged in connection with the storming of Congress by supporters of former Republican President Donald Trump.
David Dempsey, 37, of Santa Ana, California, characterised by authorities as one of the “most violent” members of the mob, was sentenced to 20 years in jail last month. The sentence was the second longest handed down thus far.
Enrique Tarrio, the former leader of the far-right Proud Boys organisation, has been convicted of seditious conspiracy and sentenced to 22 years in prison. The attack on the Capitol killed at least five individuals and injured 140 police officers.
It came after Trump delivered an impassioned speech to supporters near the White House, in which he repeated his erroneous promises about winning the 2020 race. Trump faces four federal criminal charges in Washington for attempting to change the election results, but the case is unlikely to get to trial before the November presidential election, in which he is once again the Republican nominee.
