A Texas man who rioted at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, was sentenced this Tuesday to 83 months in prison, 36 months of supervised release, and an $812 fine for his conviction of felony and misdemeanor charges, according to a press release from the Department of Justice.
Christopher Grider, 41, tried unsuccessfully to cut power to the Capitol after he breached the building. He then marched to the Crypt, where he and other rioters tried to push their way through a line of Capitol Police officers.
From the DOJ:
Grider then continued toward the House Chamber. After ascending to the second floor, Grider again beckoned other rioters to join him: “We gotta get into the Chamber! This way, this way, this way!” Within minutes, Grider reached a lobby area leading to the House Main Door. As the mob laid siege to those doors, Grider repeatedly offered up his hard black helmet to be used by the rioters as a weapon, brandishing it above his head, as other rioters yelled, “Use your helmet! Use your Kevlar!” and “We need to use our Kevlar to knock out those windows.”
A few minutes later, when the mob’s siege of the House Main Door stalled, Grider sprinted toward the Speaker’s Lobby Door. Only three Capitol Police officers, the Speaker’s Lobby glass doors, and some hastily amassed furniture on the other side of those doors stood between the mob and the evacuees. Grider watched as another rioter punched the doors’ glass panes with his bare fists, only inches away from one of the officers. Grider then sought out that rioter’s attention, knocked on the helmet, and handed the helmet to that rioter. Moments later, that rioter violently banged the helmet against the Speaker’s Lobby’s glass doors, breaking the rightmost pane. When a third rioter climbed through that opening, a Capitol Police lieutenant on the other side of the glass doors discharged one round, fatally wounding that third rioter. Grider, who had set that chain of events in motion stood only feet away.
Read the full press release here.
