One month after Capitol police officer killed in riot, and still no named suspects

He was hit in the head with a fire extinguisher, three unnamed sources told CBS-affiliated news station WUSA. Although Robert Sanford, a retired firefighter from Pennsylvania, was arrested on January 14 after he was accused of hitting multiple police officers with a fire extinguisher, he has not been linked to Sicknick’s death. The medical examiner’s office has not even released a cause of death yet.

Glenn Ivey, Prince George’s County’s former state’s attorney, told WUSA inconclusive evidence could be causing the delay. “It could be a challenge to sort out and specify who exactly did what in the middle of that riot that was going on,” Ivey said. “And they’ve got to link it directly to causing the death of Officer Sicknick, either by someone who, say, hit him with a fire extinguisher, or someone who was part of the effort to do that … maybe somebody held him while he was hit or something along those lines. And I think that’s part of the delay in moving forward with that.”

Ivey also told the news station the delay could also be the result of the FBI having to review hundreds of hours of video footage. “What the prosecutors might be doing is putting a lot of people in front of the grand jury, gathering a lot of information, and videos in particular, about who was there who might have been in the vicinity, who might have information about it,” Ivey said. “And they’re also spending a lot of time going through electronic information. They’re probably getting cell phone information as well. So it’s going to take a while for them to nail all of that down. And I’m sure they’re going to want to be thorough and careful.”

The Capitol Police officers’ union plans to hold a vote of no-confidence in its leadership, union chairman Gus Papathanasiou told WTOP News. “The union’s position hasn’t changed; we don’t have faith in the leadership of this department,” Papathanasiou said.

“We have one officer who lost his life as a direct result of the insurrection,” Papathanasiou said in a statement WUSA obtained last month. “Another officer has tragically taken his own life. Between USCP (U.S. Capitol Police) and our colleagues at the Metropolitan Police Department, we have almost 140 officers injured.

“I have officers who were not issued helmets prior to the attack who have sustained brain injuries. One officer has two cracked ribs and two smashed spinal disks. One officer is going to lose his eye, and another was stabbed with a metal fence stake.”