An armed Texas militia member accused of leading a “vigilante mob” to breach the U.S. Capitol became the first Jan. 6 rioter to get convicted by a jury on Tuesday.
Forty-nine-year-old Guy Reffitt was found guilty of all five counts against him, including bringing a gun to the Capitol grounds, as part of a MAGA mob that stormed the seat of the government to stop the electoral certification of President Joe Biden. After the siege, Reffitt came home and threatened his two children to keep quiet about his involvement in the riots.
The verdict, which a 12-person jury reached in about three hours, marks the first prosecutorial success in actually taking a riot case to trial, sending a signal to the hundreds of other accused insurrectionists who have not taken plea deals in the deadly saga.
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