The court has imposed the second-highest penalty for storming the Capitol.
U.S. courts continue to grapple with the January 6, 2021 Capitol insurrection. Now, judges have convicted one of the "most violent rioters" from that day. The 37-year-old allegedly used anything he could get his hands on against police officers, facing up to 20 years in prison.
A U.S. court has sentenced one of the attackers on the U.S. Capitol to 20 years in prison for aggravated violence during the January 2021 insurrection. According to the indictment, the 37-year-old David Dempsey used "his hands, feet, flagpoles, crutches, pepper spray, broken furniture, and anything else he could find as weapons against the police." This is the second-highest sentence related to the Capitol storming.
Prosecutors initially sought 22 years for the California resident, a former construction worker and fast-food employee. He was reportedly one of the "most violent rioters" during the Capitol attack. The prosecution also cited Dempsey's criminal history, as he pleaded guilty to two counts of assaulting police officers during the Capitol insurrection.
The January 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol, which resulted in five deaths and 140 injured law enforcement officers, shook the U.S. and is considered a dark day in U.S. democracy. Fanatical supporters of then-President Donald Trump, who had been defeated, stormed the legislative seat to prevent the formal certification of Joe Biden's presidential victory.
Trump had spent weeks spreading the false claim that he was robbed of a second term due to massive voter fraud. Just before the Capitol insurrection, the right-wing populist urged his supporters in a speech to march to the Capitol and "fight like hell." Almost a year ago, the former leader of the right-wing extremist U.S. militia Proud Boys, Enrique Tarrio, was sentenced to 22 years in prison.
The convicted individual hails from the United States of America, specifically California. The Capitol rioter's aggressive actions against law enforcement officers in the United States Capitol contributed to his potential 20-year prison sentence.
