[ad_1]
A suspected member of the Oath Keepers militia who provided security for Roger J. Stone Jr. on the day the Capitol was attacked has been arrested in connection with the riot, the federal authorities said.
The man, Roberto Minuta, was taken into custody on Saturday in Newburgh, N.Y., and was accused of breaching the Capitol after “aggressively” taunting and berating law enforcement officers, according to a criminal complaint unsealed on Monday. Prosecutors said that when federal agents arrested Mr. Minuta, 36, he asked why he was being targeted for the riot and why they were not investigating Black Lives Matter and the far-left activists known as Antifa.
Last month, The New York Times and other media outlets identified Mr. Minuta, who lives in Texas and owns a tattoo parlor in Newburgh, as one of six people with ties to the Oath Keepers who guarded Mr. Stone, a close ally and adviser to former President Donald J. Trump, on the morning of Jan. 6 or the day before.
Mr. Stone, who was pardoned on seven felony convictions by Mr. Trump, was in Washington on the day the then-president spoke to a crowd ahead of the assault on the Capitol. Mr. Stone has denied any involvement in the attack, posting a message online decrying the riot as “the lawless acts at the Capitol.”
At a hearing in Federal District Court in White Plains, N.Y., on Monday afternoon, prosecutors cited the Times account and confirmed that Mr. Minuta had provided security to celebrity clients in Washington before the attack, but did not mention Mr. Stone by name. According to court papers, Mr. Minuta traveled to Washington from New Jersey on Jan. 5 and stormed the Capitol wearing military-style tactical gear and carrying a canister of bear spray.
In May, Mr. Minuta reopened his tattoo parlor, Casa di Dolore, in defiant violation of New York State’s coronavirus restrictions. In a video he posted online, Mr. Minuta said he was disobeying the virus laws “in complete defiance of the tyrannical authority that our governor here thinks he has over the millions of people in this state.”
After the reopening, Stewart Rhodes, the founder and leader of the Oath Keepers, did an online interview with Mr. Minuta in which he said the tattoo parlor owner was being designated as “a lifetime Oath Keeper.” Prosecutors cited the interview in Mr. Minuta’s complaint.
The Oath Keepers, a paramilitary group mostly composed of former law enforcement officers and military veterans, was one of the far-right extremist organizations with the largest presence at the Capitol attack. So far, nine other accused members of the group have been charged in a wide-ranging conspiracy to overturn President Biden’s electoral victory in a plot that prosecutors say began not long after Election Day.
At the hearing on Monday, Mr. Minuta was released on bond pending trial.
[ad_2]
Source link
