Prosecutors acted with “unrelenting integrity,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said, as the Justice Department pursued cases against 1,583 people for events on Jan. 6, 2021—a date etched into the American psyche with unforgettable images of vandalism and violence at the U.S. Capitol.
President Donald Trump, who had attracted a massive crowd to Washington that day amid a dispute over his 2020 election loss, decried these cases as “political persecutions.” He tossed out the prosecutions upon his return for a second presidential term on Jan. 20.
Saying he was ending “a grave national injustice that has been perpetrated upon the American people over the last four years,” Trump commuted sentences for 14 serious Jan. 6 offenders and issued full pardons to all remaining defendants—1,569 people, based on federal data.
Trump showed mercy even to those convicted of assaulting officers—a controversial move. He previously stated that only peaceful, nonviolent offenders deserved consideration.
But he justified that decision by pointing out that the convicted Jan. 6 defendants had already been locked up for years, often in “inhumane” conditions. They were targeted for political reasons and were punished more harshly than many people who committed worse offenses, including killings, he said.
A half-dozen of the former Jan. 6 prisoners told The Epoch Times their side. The publication also reviewed Justice Department statements about each interviewee and dozens of other resources for this story.
The interviewees, ranging from a 25-year-old entrepreneur to a 55-year-old former New York police officer, say much information has been suppressed and distorted.
They, like many Americans, continue to question why security in and around the Capitol was clearly insufficient on Jan. 6.
They also suspect a government setup—and a coverup.
Although officials have rejected such claims, a government watchdog’s recent report reignited questions over the actions of “confidential human sources.” Twenty-six of these informants were present on Jan. 6, the Inspector General’s report said.
Four of the informants entered the Capitol; 13 others entered restricted areas on the grounds—without FBI permission. The FBI didn’t authorize the informants to encourage violence, either. But the report left it unclear whether informants obeyed that order.
Setting the Record Straight
The interviewed Jan. 6 defendants say many Americans still incorrectly believe that police officers were killed in the melee; 140 officers were hurt, none fatally, despite initial reports.
It’s unclear how many civilians were injured, but Trump supporters were the only people who died that day. Police fatally shot Ashli Babbitt, 35, and beat Roseanne Boyland, 34, who was knocked unconscious in a stampede; her cause of death remains in dispute. Investigators cleared officers of wrongdoing in both cases.
The Jan. 6 interviewees agreed that, as more videos surfaced, the American public has begun to see a wider, clearer picture of the day’s events.
Before violence broke out, many thousands of people listened to Trump’s speech at The Ellipse, a park about 2 miles from the Capitol, where Congress was preparing to certify the 2020 election results.
Trump said the group should march to the Capitol “peacefully and patriotically.” But before his speech ended, protesters—possibly mingled with provocateurs—had already clashed with police at the Capitol.
Videos show some people walking into the building through already-open doors—past police who made no attempt to halt them. Some of those nonviolent people faced criminal trespassing charges.
Others violently tangled with police, smashed windows, and forcibly entered the building. Nearly 200 people pleaded guilty to assaulting officers. Officials set property damage at $1.5 million.
Common Themes Emerge
Several Jan. 6 interviewees say they regretted reacting badly amid the mayhem as police fired munitions and chemicals.
Some people accused police of excessive, unprovoked force. Those accusers include a retired New York police officer. However, a Capitol Police report found all 293 reported uses of force were justified—and a survey found some officers complained they were discouraged from using sufficient force to repel aggressors.
Two of the six interviewees were convicted of assaulting officers—the offense that sparked much criticism of the Trump pardons. Both of those defendants’ alleged assaults were tied to retaliating against police with pepper spray or pushing against barricades.
All six interviewees allege they were subject to constitutional rights violations, harassment, and other maltreatment because of their status as Jan. 6 defendants.
None of those interviewees was convicted of seditious conspiracy; one was acquitted.
They consistently stated that it was preposterous to call them “insurrectionists” and rejected prosecutors’ assertions that they tried to halt the peaceful transfer of power from Trump to President-elect Joe Biden.
At most, the interviewees said they expected Congress to pause the election certification to allow further exploration of election irregularities in a half-dozen states. Some said they didn’t even intend to protest; they just wanted to hear Trump speak and show support for him.
All expressed gratitude to Trump for acting on their behalf.
And all are hopeful that a new congressional probe will “uncover the full truth that is owed to the American people,” as House Speaker Mike Johnson ((R-La.) stated on Jan. 22.
Several Jan. 6 defendants said that now that they have regained their freedom, revealing the truth about Jan. 6 is their most fervent wish.
Nonviolent 21-Year-Old Labeled a ‘Terrorist’
Alexander Sheppard recalls that, as a schoolboy in Worthington, a historic central Ohio community of 15,000 people, he learned about Americans’ constitutionally guaranteed rights.
But he says being prosecuted for Jan. 6 shattered his “naïve” notions about exercising his rights to free speech and protest.
Just before Jan. 6, Sheppard was a 21-year-old marketing entrepreneur. He made a last-minute decision to make a six-hour drive from Ohio to Washington for Trump’s “Save America” or “Stop the Steal” rally.
He arrived at 6 a.m., early enough to score a close spot at the Ellipse. He stood in a massive crowd, about a half-dozen rows away from the stage, as Trump delivered his speech that afternoon.
“It was an atmosphere of love and patriotism and love for our country,” Sheppard said.
But after marching to the Capitol, he saw officers firing tear gas into the crowd. At times, he and others got “riled up” over police “using unnecessary force on people.”
Amid the chaos, “I made the dumb decision to go inside the building,” he said. “I didn’t think I was breaking any laws. Like I said, I thought we had a First Amendment right to protest.”
Upon entering the Capitol, he and others were mesmerized by its grandeur. He took many videos and pictures that were later used against him.
“If I thought I were committing a crime, I wouldn’t have recorded so much of it,” he said, adding that he remained nonviolent and committed no vandalism.
Fatefully, Sheppard was nearby when Babbitt was shot; he drew his hands to his head in disbelief as she fell to the floor. His proximity to that much-scrutinized event probably made him more high-profile, he said. The officers escorted him and others out of the area.
Nearly two months later, just after Sheppard set foot inside the airport in Columbus, Ohio, for a business trip, about 10 federal agents swooped in.
He was stunned to be arrested. He was even more shocked to be facing a felony charge of obstructing an official proceeding, plus five misdemeanors for being disorderly and protesting inside the Capitol.
Sheppard was released to await trial. Two years later, in January 2023, jurors convicted him of five charges. His sole acquittal: a misdemeanor for entering a room where he photographed a portrait of America’s first president, George Washington.
A judge sentenced Sheppard to 19 months in prison, half the time prosecutors had sought.
In prison, Sheppard learned he was labeled a “terrorist,” which disqualified him from certain privileges.
He asks, “How could I be labeled a ‘terrorist’ when I was charged with nothing violent?”
Even before the Supreme Court issued its June ruling, a judge agreed with Sheppard’s attorney’s contention that the Fischer case raised a “substantial question” about the validity of his sole felony conviction.
Sheppard’s lawyer claimed “that question will not be decided until after he has served more time in prison than is warranted by his misdemeanor convictions,” a judge wrote in January 2024. “Accordingly, he asks the Court to release him from prison at the end of his likely misdemeanor sentence.”
The judge cut Sheppard’s prison term to six months; he was released in May 2024.
He said he still benefited “in a big way” from Trump’s pardon. It wiped his criminal convictions—but not charges—from his record. And it lifted his post-release requirements, such as obtaining permission to travel outside of southern Ohio, submitting to urinalysis, and reporting to a court official.
Now 25, Sheppard has been doing menial labor but hopes to land a better job; he mourns the loss of his solid reputation and unblemished record.
But he sees public and media perceptions shifting.
“When I was facing more than 20 years in prison, I was a ‘January 6 Insurrectionist.’ Later on, I was referred to as a ‘Capitol Rioter.’ Now that I WON in the Supreme Court, was PARDONED by the President, and will have ALL charges dismissed, I am called a ‘January 6 Participant,’ he wrote in a Jan. 29 social media post.
He wants people to know: “We were all denied constitutional due process, and that is why it made sense for President Trump to pardon basically everyone.”
“This pardon, it really gives to all of us a new lease on life,” he said. “We get to start fresh.”
Mother of 8 Has Some Regrets but Bright Outlook
Rachel Powell says she went to Washington on Jan. 6 to protect America’s future for her eight children and seven grandchildren—but ended up being separated from them for many months because of it.
Now 44, Powell said she had harbored concerns—which grew after the 2020 election—about election integrity in her home state of Pennsylvania. She wanted her children to inherit “a fair and free vote.”
“Everything in America depends on that,” she said.
But Powell admits regretting some of her actions on Jan. 6. Outrage over officers’ seemingly unprovoked use of force hijacked her better judgment, she said.
Accused of pushing barricades, Powell said that was a misperception. “The police were moving the barricades towards us,” she said.
“And people like me, I wasn’t going to move,” Powell said. “I was going to stand there and hold the line—because I had the right to.”
She entered several locations in and around the Capitol. People were jammed into the West Terrace tunnel and falling on top of each other.
“I could hear a woman screaming for help at the bottom of that pile,” near the tunnel entrance, Powell said.
Powell helped other people to pull fallen protesters out of the way. “By [the] time we got to the bottom of that pile … there was Roseanne Boyland, clearly dead at my feet,” she said.
Horrified and fearful for her safety, Powell retreated to the other side of the building.
In an act she now sees as irrational, she decided to break a window. Powell thought that creating a new ingress point for protesters would prevent other deaths. “And I know that that sounds crazy, but that’s what it was,” she said.
Powell said people in the crowd passed implements to her, which she used to strike the window frame, including an object that prosecutors called “an ice axe.”
“And from using that tool for probably 60 seconds, they gave me a deadly weapons charge,” she said, adding that the axe “disappeared back into the crowd” and she “never saw it again.”
Shortly after that, police fired exploding canisters of noxious gas, and she couldn’t see or breathe. “It’s like, all of a sudden, it just snapped me out of it. And I was like, ‘What are you doing?’” she said.
Powell struggled her way out and left.
In a little more than a week, the FBI circulated a “wanted” poster showing pictures of her in a pink knit hat and sunglasses.
On Feb. 4, 2021, police raided her home in Mercer County, Pennsylvania; they broke through the door as a helicopter hovered overhead. Powell, who wasn’t home then, turned herself in. She was freed under strict home confinement rules.
Afterward, a court ordered Powell’s minor children to remain in the custody of another relative. The separation was particularly gut-wrenching because Powell enjoyed more togetherness with her children than many moms. She became a single mother after her 17-year marriage disintegrated and was also a homeschooler and homesteader.
Her case finally went to a bench trial in mid-2023. She denied leading any organized effort to overtake the Capitol despite using a bullhorn to direct other protesters. Powell told The Epoch Times that she borrowed the bullhorn from another protester, and she was relaying information about the Capitol’s layout based solely on her observations that day—her first visit to the Capitol.
“I did not know the layout of the whole Capitol,” she said, alleging that prosecutors “tried to paint me as a ringleader.”
In late 2023, a judge convicted Powell of nine charges, including obstruction of an official proceeding, destruction of government property, civil disorder, and “physical violence … with a deadly or dangerous weapon.”
In early 2024, she began serving a prison term of 57 months—nearly five years—with no credit for three years of house arrest.
“I don’t understand how that’s happening in America, that American citizens can be detained in their homes for undetermined amounts of time,” she said, calling that practice an injustice that should end.
Powell’s experiences at a West Virginia prison caused her even more concern.
She was housed at the Federal Correctional Complex Hazelton—a facility where whistleblowers alleged “a rampant culture of abuse and misconduct,” several senators wrote in September 2023.
They called on the Attorney General and Bureau of Prisons to investigate. The Epoch Times was unable to determine the results of that probe by publication time.
Powell alleges she witnessed deplorable conditions and medical neglect of inmates, echoing the whistleblowers’ complaints.
Now, Powell said she is on a mission to reform conditions at that prison “because once you see it, you can’t unsee it, and it would be wrong not to do something about it and to leave those women in there, suffering.”
“It’s the right thing to do,” she said—the same phrase she used to describe her motivation for participating in the Jan. 6 protest.
But if she could do it over again, Powell said she would have just sat down in protest, “and I would have never left that public sidewalk—ever.”
After being pardoned, Powell sees a bright future—for America and her family.
“I love our president. I think he’s a good man. I think the next four years are going to be fantastic … and I think that the time is ripe for these changes,” she said.
Being away from her loved ones made her value them more.
“We’re all gonna be stronger because of this, and we’re all more loving … we want more unity in our family,” she said.
“It’s like a phoenix rising from the ashes … I really think it’s going to be beautiful.”
Pre-Dawn Tactical Team Arrests Husband-to-Be
Barry Ramey, then a 38-year-old aircraft mechanic, was living a good life in sunny Florida and was engaged to be married.
But around 5:30 a.m. on April 21, 2022, as he left his apartment to go to work, a tactical team rushed him in the parking lot, “flashbangs thrown at me, and guns pointed at me,” Ramey said. That was nearly 16 months after Jan. 6, 2021—and two months before his planned wedding date.
Afterward, Ramey said he accepted responsibility for his actions, which included discharging pepper spray at police on Jan. 6. But he said the accusations and punishment he faced as a result were “over-the-top.”
“I know I committed a criminal act, but I’m not a criminal … I don’t live a life of crime,” Ramey, now 41, told The Epoch Times after Trump pardoned him. He had no prior criminal history, court records confirm.
As Ramey awaited word on a possible pardon, “it was definitely a nail-biting situation,” he said. Ramey thought that he might only get his sentence commuted because his assault conviction classified him as a violent offender.
He also was connected to the Proud Boys, one of the most controversial groups of Jan. 6 defendants.
On Jan. 6, Ramey gathered with the Proud Boys group, although he did not know who they were at that time, his attorney said in a court record. Since then, Ramey said he and other Jan. 6 defendants started a Proud Boys chapter “to look out for one another in very dangerous situations” while incarcerated.
Five Proud Boys were among the 14 offenders whose sentences Trump commuted; they were freed from prison, but their convictions remain in their records.
Ramey received a “full and unconditional” pardon.
“It feels good to know I don’t have to live my life as a convicted felon,” he said. “I can go back to being a productive member of society and trying to leave the world a better place than I found it.”
In March 2023, Ramey was sentenced to five years in prison for felony charges of civil disorder and “assaulting, resisting, or impeding certain officers,” a Justice Department statement noted, along with misdemeanors for disorderly conduct and “physical violence” on the Capitol grounds; he did not enter the building, his attorney said.
Prosecutors argued he deserved a harsher prison term because he attacked police with a “deadly and dangerous weapon”—the pepper spray.
Ramey countered: “The police use it all the time. They even get pepper-sprayed in their training. So [if] it wasn’t deadly and dangerous then, is it deadly and dangerous now?”
He said he’s not trying to justify his actions, but he doesn’t think his wrongdoing justified charging him with crimes that are “essentially one step underneath an attempted murder.”
If people “start digging,” that will reveal unjust tactics that were used on “pretty much all of us,” he said. Ramey hopes that truthful reporting of more facts will prevent other alleged political prosecutions.
His fiancée, Desiree Rowland, detailed his ordeal on a GiveSendGo fundraising account, saying Ramey was denied bail and was shuffled among 12 different prisons in a 16-month span awaiting trial.
He was repeatedly locked in solitary confinement and was denied medical care, she wrote; he was served food that was moldy or bug-infested, and his health deteriorated.
In November 2024, Ramey was transferred from prison to a halfway house in Miami; that is where he was on Jan. 20, when Trump pardoned him.
Rowland told The Epoch Times they are busy rebuilding their lives, and she would love to book their wedding at a notable location: Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida.
In addition to making wedding plans, Ramey said he wants to become more politically involved, despite what happened to him after Jan. 6.
He wants to help “America First” groups turn Broward County, where he lives, from Democratic “blue” to Republican “red.”
He also remains determined to continue exposing the truth about Jan. 6.
“I think there’s a lot of the false narrative that still surrounds us, like a cloud over us,” he said.
Not a ‘Menace to Society’ Despite Portrayals
Pete Schwartz had always wanted to hear Trump speak in person, but his job as a traveling welder had gotten in the way.
In January 2021, he happened to be working within a three-hour drive from Trump’s Jan. 6 rally in Washington.
He and his wife, who went with him to the rally, were both criminally charged for involvement in a protest that they hadn’t anticipated. Their marriage ended amid the turmoil.
Before Schwartz, 51, was pardoned, he was serving a 14-year prison term for nine felonies and two misdemeanors.
His convictions included four assaults on police—even though prosecutors conceded that “no officer can attribute their injuries specifically to Mr. Schwartz,” a court record shows. They argued his actions “contributed to the dangerousness of the mob.” And the assault charge does encompass “resisting, or impeding law enforcement officers.”
But, in Schwartz’s view, the assault convictions are among many examples of mischaracterizations in his case.
When he and his wife arrived at the Capitol, they wanted to see what was causing the commotion, so they got closer.
She held up her cellphone to shoot a video, he said, “and 59 seconds into it, a grenade, one of those flashbang grenades, buzzed right past her head.”
But the couple was forced to move closer to the police because “there was people still flowing in behind us, and the crowd’s pushing us forward,” he said.
Schwartz said he went into what he called “a hyper-awareness mode,” trying to keep himself and his wife safe.
They “kept getting hit” with noxious gases. He found a bag that contained canisters of chemical irritants, apparently left behind by police. He later wondered whether the canisters were purposely planted to entice people like him to pick them up.
He said he “sprayed a little bit” as a “warning” to keep police back, asserting that the spray did not contact any officers.
Sometime thereafter, Schwartz and his wife were able to push their way out of the crowd; they left.
“I didn’t think I did anything wrong, so I wasn’t worried about getting arrested,” he said.
But on Feb. 2, 2021, about 30 officers “jumped out when I came out on my front porch” of a rented home in Uniontown, Pennsylvania, Schwartz said.
Officers removed a hand restraint so he could unlock his phone to get phone numbers for people. But an officer “snatched” it and began scrolling through it for evidence, Schwartz said.
An appeals court ruled that was a constitutional violation—a Jan. 17 decision whose effect appears to be moot following Trump’s pardon.
But information from the phone was used against Schwartz during his trial.
He had texted “yes” to a politician’s survey asking whether he supported objections to the 2020 election certification. Schwartz said prosecutors used that text to allege his Jan. 6 involvement was pre-planned, supporting the “obstruction of an official proceeding” allegation.
Schwartz was tried with two codefendants who were strangers to him. He says that alone was an injustice. Prosecutors said he “coordinated” with those men from California and Virginia by sharing the gas canisters amongst themselves, a court filing said.
Another stranger, Shelley Freeman, was a godsend. She provided transportation for him after learning he would be released from a prison within a 90-minute drive from her home in Clements, California.
Freeman, who waited six hours for Schwartz to be freed, told The Epoch Times she assisted because she was deeply troubled by the government’s handling of Jan. 6 cases.
She attended the protest and witnessed black-clad suspected Antifa members in the bushes, changing into Trump-supporting gear. She believes such imposters instigated violence, possibly with government operatives.
Freeman said she did not enter the Capitol or engage in confrontations. But she feared charges against her had been possible.
Just before Trump took office, federal prosecutors revealed they “generally declined to charge individuals whose only crimes were illegally entering the grounds around the U.S. Capitol.” But they had considered 400 such cases.
Schwartz is grateful for Freeman, whose presence initially took him aback. He remembers thinking, “I just got out of the largest government conspiracy entrapment in the history of the United States, and I wasn’t sure who was picking me up or what to expect.”
Within days of his release, he flew to Kentucky for a joyful reunion with his elderly parents.
Schwartz said he misses being “good old Pete” rather than “a novelty” to people curious about his experiences as a Jan. 6 defendant.
He also is troubled by publicity focusing on his past criminal record, which he said makes him look like “a menace to society.”
“I read about myself, and I say, ‘Holy crap, get this guy off the streets,’” Schwartz said.
But he says most of his prior convictions involved driving-related charges and other offenses that do not fairly reflect the person he is today.
“It’s like berating an ex-alcoholic for drinking [but] he has been dry for years,” Schwartz said.
Schwartz said he would rather stay out of the spotlight but intends to continue speaking out because of “an obligation to turning this country around, to turning the prisons around.”
Besides, he said, “No matter, under any circumstances, am I ever going to have my life back.”
Pardoned Ex-NYPD Officer
As a nine-year New York police officer who responded to the 2001 terrorist attacks, Sara Carpenter said proper police procedures remain ingrained in her.
On Jan. 6, 17 years after she retired on a 9/11-related disability, Carpenter said she observed police were woefully understaffed and were responding inappropriately that day—opinions that concur with concerns that experts, lawmakers, and others raised.
Official explanations for those alleged security lapses don’t hold water with her.
“It dumbfounds me how people are just accepting this one-sided story,” Carpenter, 55, told The Epoch Times on Jan. 28, after she was released from an Alabama prison.
“How is it that everyone is accepting the fact that grandmas were able to get into the building?”
Carpenter admits her behavior was out-of-line at times, but said “my actions were not criminal,” and says the accusations put her in a false light. And she faults certain police officers for escalating the situation and provoking people.
“I know that they’re put in perilous situations, but what they did was so unprofessional … they endangered other officers as well as citizens,” she said. “We were at a rally; they caused a riot.”
She also blames agitators for touching off the violence.
“The American citizens absolutely were peaceful,” she said. “It was literally a small fraction of some element that had done this—and it wasn’t the rallygoers.”
Carpenter was convicted of felonies for civil disorder and obstruction of an official proceeding, plus five misdemeanors for being present and unruly in and around the then-restricted Capitol.
In hindsight, Carpenter concurs with other Jan. 6 defendants who say they were waltzed into a trap and then faced unfair criminal proceedings.
“I feel very cheated, and I know that I had no intent to stop a governmental proceeding, nor did I have an intent to protest or to lose my cool inside the Capitol,” she said.
After a last-minute decision to drive four hours from New York and then listening to Trump’s speech, Carpenter almost didn’t go to the Capitol; she wanted to go home to her son. But a lifelong friend urged, “C’mon, it’s a once-in-a-lifetime thing; it’s so patriotic!”
En route, she specifically looked for police. She saw none. That struck her as odd.
That concern persisted. Carpenter said she has seen more police at a Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade in New York than she saw at the Capitol on Jan. 6.
She went on high alert after a man claimed he had been “maced” and saw people climbing up perilous scaffolding that had been set up for Biden’s inauguration.
Carpenter ascended a staircase, still looking for police. When she got to the top of the stairs, she turned around to a sight that took her breath away—in a good way.
“There was nothing threatening about it. It was beautiful,” she said. “It was just a sea of patriotic citizens. That’s what I saw.”
Finally, she saw people wearing yellow reflective vests and realized they were police officers. “They were just casually standing there,” she said.
After Carpenter greeted them, a female officer motioned with her hand, across her body, “like, go that way,” Carpenter said.
“I thought they were letting us in to witness what was going on … to see them present election interference,” she said.
Carpenter felt uneasy about police officers letting so many people inside. “But they’re the ones in charge,” she said, figuring they knew what they were doing.
A college-educated artist, Carpenter couldn’t take her eyes off the Capitol dome’s interior. But a man ran past her, reigniting her police sense that something seemed amiss. She followed him, thinking maybe someone needed help.
Carpenter saw lines of people “dressed like cops,” but they stood in a “squished-together,” unorganized formation, she said.
“There was something not right with the way they were performing their jobs,” she noted.
Throughout her experience, the police weren’t following crowd-control protocol.
“They were not making any vocal statements. They were not trying to de-escalate,” Carpenter said.
She started to get angry over how police were behaving, perceiving that they were blocking citizens from exercising their rights. She said an officer pushed her at one point, and she retorted, “This is our house!”
Further igniting her passions, an unidentified man—possibly a provocateur—turned to her and “began the narrative that ‘this was like 9/11,’” she said. Some politicians later used that phrase to describe how horrible Jan. 6 was.
Indignant, she blurted back: “This is nothing like 9/11! I was in 9/11 … my sergeant died [on] 9/11, I went through bodies on 9/11!”
At another point, Carpenter ended up in a narrow hallway in a confrontation with police. A man yelled, “Push!” The crowd was packed into the area; she had nowhere to go. Carpenter feared she would be trampled to death. In a video, she can be heard yelling, “Tell my son I did this for him!”
An Irish Catholic, Carpenter began reciting prayers. “And just like the Red Sea, all of a sudden, the whole crowd started to recede,” she said.
But after she regained her footing, a trio of police fired mace at her. Her rosary beads had fallen to the ground. She retrieved them and continued to pray, standing still for a long time. She can’t explain why she didn’t move. “Maybe I just didn’t know where to go,” she said.
Finally, an officer came up to her and told her to leave. She responded: “You invited us in. How about you finish the tour?” She told the police they needed to let just one witness into the area where Congress was meeting. An officer convinced her that the questions would be answered at some other point.
“I thought, ‘Okay, there will be a place and a time where we can understand,’” she said. And then she started to leave.
An officer ran up to her and said, “Hey, get home safe.”
“He knew what was happening was wrong, and he felt for me,” she said.
She turned to the officer and said, “I don’t know where to feel safe now.”
Carpenter said she was treated at a hospital for a possible injury.
Later, police questioned her. She said the exchange was friendly, and they were respectful of her status as a retired officer.
But she felt betrayed when police raided her home in Queens; her street was shut down as helicopters circled.
She was released on her promise to appear in court.
Carpenter said many things troubled her about how her case proceeded and has been described.
She strongly disputes a Justice Department statement asserting that she “slapped the arms of law enforcement officers who were trying to hold her back from further intruding into the Capitol.”
“If there’s a video of me out there hitting a cop, I want to see it,” she said.
Oath Keeper: Sole Mission Was to Help People
Jessica Watkins, 42, describes a “service-driven” life infused with patriotism.
Watkins served in the U.S. Army in Afghanistan, as a firefighter and medic in North Carolina, and as an emergency-aid volunteer in 2008 when Hurricane Ike caused widespread damage in Texas and elsewhere.
Ironically, that inclination to help others sparked participation in the Oath Keepers militia group—and put Watkins at the epicenter of the Jan. 6 controversies.
Nine people connected to that group, including Watkins, were among the 14 former Jan. 6 convicts who received commuted sentences rather than full pardons from Trump.
The Oath Keepers suffer from misconceptions about who they are and what they do, Watkins said. “I don’t appreciate being called a rioter. I was there helping people, stopping vandalism … I wasn’t there to overthrow democracy.
“I’m not an extremist. I’m not a racist.”
Oath Keepers are people dedicated to upholding the Constitution, and they mostly come from military and law enforcement backgrounds, Watkins said. “We document crimes to help law enforcement and provide medical attention …We’re nothing like what they say.”
Watkins owned a tavern in Ohio and started a chapter of the Oath Keepers to protect businesses from civil unrest that swept the United States in 2020.
Riots, fires, and looting plagued many U.S. communities amid demonstrations over the death of an unarmed, handcuffed black man, George Floyd, 46, while in police custody in Minneapolis.
When Jan. 6, 2021, rolled around, word circulated that troublemakers might show up. That’s why the Oath Keepers promised to come to protect people who were scheduled to give speeches at permitted gatherings on Jan. 6, Watkins said.
Watkins was among many people accused of coordinating efforts to overtake the congressional proceedings on Jan. 6. However, Watkins was recovering from recent injuries and almost stayed home.
“I was convinced to go because I was the only trained medic,” Watkins said. “I was the only experienced person.”
Clad in their usual protective gear—drab olive pants with black tactical vests and helmets—about a dozen Oath Keepers, including Watkins, escorted their protectees as planned, Watkins said, functioning as “contracted security” but on an unpaid, volunteer basis.
Their duties went off “without a hitch,” Watkins said, and then the group decided to “go check out this protest.”
According to Watkins, the festive atmosphere changed after word spread that Vice President Mike Pence had refused to intervene in the congressional vote certification, as many believed was his duty.
Oath Keepers, including Watkins, ascended the stairs because they could hear people using bullhorns. Doors to the Capitol were open, and a crowd started rushing in, almost like overzealous shoppers in “a Black Friday-type moment, Watkins said.
With no police in sight, it seemed OK to follow the crowd into the building’s east side, Watkins said, unaware of the violent clashes that happened on the west side.
In hindsight, Watkins regrets walking through those doors but was propelled by a blend of curiosity and excitement.
Watkins said the mood inside was mixed. There were some angry chants echoing in the hallways, and Watkins recalls stopping a man from breaking windows.
“But when we walked in the Rotunda, everybody was, like, hugging, and we were singing, ‘Glory, glory, hallelujah,’ and there’s like, prayer circles,” Watkins said. “It was so cool at that point.”
Suddenly, the crowd started pushing into the police. Videos later helped Watkins figure out why: “The cops up front had started beating people … without any warning or anything like that.”
At other protests that Watkins had witnessed if crowds got unruly, officers would typically warn: “This has been declared an unlawful assembly. You have to vacate. If you don’t, you’re going to be charged,” she said. Watkins is convinced many people would have heeded such warnings if they had been issued.
“None of that happened. It was literally just—bam!—they started attacking,” Watkins said.
Amid the chaos, Watkins “got sandwiched” between people and felt excruciating pain from recently healed broken ribs and a broken arm.
“I just kind of, like, snapped. I just started screaming. I was like, ‘Push, push, come on!’” Watkins said, admitting, “I got kind of whipped into it, you know.”
Eventually, Watkins reunited with a fellow Oath Keeper in the scrum; both wanted to leave, but neither could move. “We were just, like, glued there,” Watkins said.
At one point, an officer was somehow hoisted above the fray. Watkins said the officer discharged a chemical irritant that “rained down” on a large crowd that included Watkins.
Eventually, Watkins and other Oath Keepers extricated themselves. They pushed their way outside, carrying a young asthmatic who had been overcome by the fumes; Watkins assisted that patient. Other people started hollering they needed treatment, too.
“And the cops just let us stand there and help,” Watkins said.
As things settled, “I chatted with the cops a little bit, you know, like thanking them for their service,” Watkins said.
Oath Keepers, including Watkins, left the area, thinking they had done nothing wrong.
Within days, the FBI raided Watkins’s home; Watkins surrendered on charges punishable by life imprisonment.
Watkins refused a plea deal to serve “only 20 years.” It would have required admitting to seditious conspiracy and destruction of government property—”two things I knew I didn’t do,” Watkins said.
After a hard-fought trial, Watkins scored acquittals from a jury on those two charges—a fact the Justice Department omitted from two 2023 news releases about Watkins’s convictions and sentencing.
Several fellow Oath Keepers weren’t as fortunate. The group’s founder, Stewart Rhodes, was convicted of seditious conspiracy and sentenced to 18 years in prison.
Watkins was sentenced to about half that time. Trump’s pardon wiped out the remainder of that term, but not Watkins’s record of convictions: conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, obstruction of an official proceeding, interfering with law enforcement officers during a civil disorder, and conspiracy to prevent an officer from discharging duties.
Trump has said he might consider a full pardon for those whose sentences were commuted; Watkins is pushing for that but is overjoyed to be freed after four years behind bars, including time spent in allegedly abusive circumstances.
Upon release from prison, “I wanted to laugh. I wanted to cry … and to know that President Trump cared can’t be understated,” Watkins said. “We faced so much opposition, and there was so much fear that it wouldn’t happen.
“It was like I was hallucinating, a dream or something—it didn’t feel tangible.”
Sam Dorman contributed to this article.