Sergeant Fuson Nguyen, 19-year veteran of DC police, he said It was already was hit once with some of chemical spray; he moved to back of tunnel and cleared his eyes, then returned to the front line with mask on. Surveillance and police body-Camera video is playing in Court found that Fitzsimons reached out to pull off Nguyen’s mask off while another man sprayed what Nguyen thought was bear spray directly in his face. Then Fitzsimons released the mask back on Nguyen’s face, trapping a chemical irritant inside, the officer said.
“At that moment, I was suffocating under the mask,” Nguyen testified. “I also got hit down in the same time. … In my head I thought that was all for to me. I thought this is where I’m going die. … In my head I said to myself: “If you want see your family again you need get together.” He said he broke the seal on his mask and a colleague dragged him into safety.
After three days of testimonies and dozens of videos and photos of Fitzsimon on the grounds of the Capitol on On January 6, the judge hearing the case decided on Friday not to issue sentence on six criminal offences, including assaulting police officers and obstructing official production and five misdemeanors. Instead, U.S. District Judge Rudolph Contreras stated that first consider defense motion to drop certain charges and issue ruling after Labor Day.
Fitzsimons, 38, from Lebanon, Maine, was detained in jail since February and is currently in Columbia region jail. He chose bench trial, not a jury trial, and on Thursday he elected not testify in a business.
Capitol Police Sergeant. Aquilino Gonell, who testified before Congress about his ordeal said the Fitzsimons grabbed him left hand and tried to pull it out of tunnel while he was leaning in opposite direction and the video showed two men struggling. Pain pierced him left shoulder, “one of worst pains i felt in my life,” said Gonnell. He said he had a partially torn rotator cuff and upper lip, had undergone surgery, and now faces mandatory medical resignation from the Capitol Police.
D.C. officer Sarah Beaver was also in tunnel, after retreating from a previously lost skirmish on perimeter of the Capitol. Video footage shows Fitzsimons throwing an unstringed archery bow, which he told a reporter he brought into the county as sign of peace, into the tunnel and beat the beaver in in head. She was wearing the helmet was not damaged, although it staggered. But spend hours in in small tunnel, Beaver said “I couldn’t breathe and I was afraid if I pass out I was going to die”.
Fitzsimons Attorney, Natasha Taylor-Smith, Federal public defense attorney from Philadelphia, said the video evidence is not clear show Fitzsimons grabs Nguyen’s or Gonell’s gas mask shield. She said that Nguyen “just got it wrong” as to which rioter grabbed the mask, and that Fitzsimons was severely stunned by the chemical spray coming from both sides when he allegedly grabbed Gonell’s arm or shield.
Because the photo of the bloodied Fitzsimons was widely published, according to Taylor-Smith, he “became a role model”. for January 6″. She said he didn’t bring weapons to the Capitol. prosecutors considered his bow a weapon and criticized Gonell, saying that he wrote a book, gave several interviews and tried to cash in on his experience. Gonell denied this.
Although charges of assault and obstruction maximum phrases of 20 years, federal sentencing rules suggest possible range of 63 to 78 months in prison for Fitzsimons, if convicted. range could rise from 87 to 108 months with Gonell’s shoulder injury classified as “permanent”.
Fitzsimons made no attempt to hide his distrust of in results of 2020 elections or his desire to be heard in Washington. In December 2020 he posted request on “Truth Seekers in Lebanon, Maine” Facebook page trying to organize a caravan to D.C. on January 6, the page administrator said. He has no applicants.
Fitzsimons also left three voice- mail messages for Rep. Jared Golden (D-Maine) the same month, Chief of Golden. of employees testified one of which began like this: “So what’s going on on with electoral fraud? Fitzsimons continued, according to voice mail reproduced in court: “I will down in COLUMBIA REGION on 6th. I don’t think I’ll see you there. Maybe I will. Maybe I will.”
When Fitzsimons returned to Maine after January 6, he called a meeting of the Lebanon Selection Board and treated board with his experience. “I couldn’t imagine more peaceful revolution,” Fitzsimons said. He also was interviewed by the Rochester Voice, founded in New Hampshire and provided photos of himself in the Capitol, but did not mention his hand-to-hand combat. combat with police, according to prosecutors.
Fitzsimons, the butcher of trade, told The Voice’s Harrison Thorpe that after he attended President Donald Trump’s “Stop theft” rally, on January 6, he went to his car and put on his white butcher’s coat, with his name embroidered on chest, along with his rubber apron and fur coat. He also said he had an unstrung archery bow “to signify his peaceful intentions”.
He was soon captured on video getting up on stage set up for upcoming inauguration of Joe Biden and holding a bow. Fitzsimons has been spotted on video with the cry “Freedom” before winding up in the West Terrace Tunnel. During his confrontation with Nguyen video shows unknown man approaching over Fitzsimons shoulder with a powerful spray and release it near Fitzsimons’ shop. face. At the same time, the police officer also pointing the spray can at Fitzsimons, an officer body-camera video showed.
Meeting with Happened to Gonell while he was holding his circular shield with his left hand and leaning down to help somebody else who fell. Gonell said he never participated in argument with protester, through the hundreds of demonstrations, in its 16 years old on Capitol Police force.
Another protester who attacked Gonell, Mark Ponder, ran his pole into the shield, breaking a pole and shield. Gonell spoke at Ponder’s sentencing in July when Ponder got 63 months old prison term.
Beaver said in every way of police equipment was torn apart off officers and then thrown back into the tunnel to the police. “I was hit with police batons,” she said. “I saw gun flies into the tunnel. Fire extinguishers. I have a whole jar of bear spray.
After the Fitzsimons wrestled with both Nguyen and Gonell were seen on CCTV standing up and then crashing headfirst into the line of officers with his fists are swinging. He was quickly beaten off. During that run prosecutors said that another rioter, brandishing a metal crutch, hit Fitzsimons. in vertex of in the head, opening a bloody wound that needed six staples for closing.
Beaver and Gonell said they believe their hours-a long post inside the tunnel blocked the only way the rioters were able to enter the Capitol, and only later did they learn that the rioters had forced their way into another place.
“Not one ever drove through the West Terrace Tunnel that day,” Beaver said. “We made sure That did not happen”.
