Son of Confederate flag-wielding rioter sentenced to 24 months for Jan. 6 breach

One of the first rioters to breach the Capitol on Jan. 6 has been sentenced to 24 months in prison for barging through a shattered window and helping chase a police officer near the Senate chamber.

Hunter Seefried watched as another rioter — Proud Boy Dominic Pezzola — used a police shield to shatter a Capitol window, triggering the breach of the building. Seefried then helped clear glass from the window frame and entered the building.

He was accompanied by his father, Kevin Seefried, who infamously wielded a Confederate flag inside the Capitol. The elder Seefried, who is due to be sentenced in January, was granted permission to attend his son’s sentencing but didn’t appear to be in the courtroom. Hunter Seefried’s mother, girlfriend, brother and two family friends were in attendance.

U.S. District Court Judge Trevor McFadden described Seefried’s conduct as a “flagrant affront to our system of government” that was made more “appalling” by his participation in the chase of U.S. Capitol Police Officer Eugene Goodman through the Senate halls.

The sentencing is the latest effort by judges in the U.S. District Court of Washington D.C. to figure out punishment for crimes that defy comparison to any others in U.S. history. The Justice Department has called its investigation of that day’s events as the largest investigation in U.S. history and have charged more than 850 people with crimes ranging from simple trespassing to seditious conspiracy.

Judges have typically reserved their harshest penalties for rioters who pre-planned efforts to disrupt the transfer of power from Donald Trump to Joe Biden, sometimes as part of groups like the far right Proud Boys or Oath Keepers. They’ve also delivered the stiffest sentences to those who engaged in violence against police, 140 of whom were injured defending the Capitol.

Hundreds of rioters have pleaded guilty to their roles in the events of Jan. 6, and dozens more have been convicted by juries, who have delivered guilty verdicts on every charge they’ve received so far. McFadden has dealt the government its only Jan. 6 trial defeats, acquitting a small number of rioters on several charges in bench trials, in which the defendants waive their right to a jury. However, he has also found several rioters guilty of felony offenses and doled out significant terms of incarceration in some of those cases.

McFadden found both Seefrieds guilty after a bench trial in June. Though prosecutors had asked that the younger Seefriend receive 64 months in prison, McFadden described their recommendation as “overly harsh” given that Seefriend is not charged with committing any violence. He also appeared swayed by Seefried’s tearful statement of remorse, in which he described Jan. 6 as a “stain” on his character and on the country.

“I believe you are a good man who messed up badly,” McFadden said after describing Seefried’s actions as an element of the “national embarrassment” that the Jan. 6 attack represents.

But McFadden also said that Seefried, who was 21 at the time of the Capitol breach, appeared to suffer from an “impulsiveness that is in part attributable to your age.” Seefried and his attorney also at times suggested that the younger Seefried had been heavily influenced by his father, who brought the family to Washington for Donald Trump’s Jan. 6 rally and steered them toward the Capitol.

Seefried’s mother, Stephanie, said that if her son hadn’t gotten separated from her in the crowd, “I would never have let this happen.”