WASHINGTON (CN) — A former sheriff’s deputy was sentenced to 70 months in prison Thursday for dragging a police officer into the mob during the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Ronald Colton McAbee, 30, traveled to Washington from Tennessee decked in a bulletproof vest with a “Sheriff” patch and gloves with reinforced knuckles. There, he clashed with Capitol Police officers around the tunnel at the Lower West Terrace, the site of the day’s worst violence.
McAbee will receive credit for the two years and seven months he has served behind bars since his arrest.
U.S. District Judge Rudolph Contreras, speaking after he passed down the nearly six-year sentence, said that the fact McAbee had spent much of his career in law enforcement made his conduct all the more serious and surprising.
“I take attacks on law enforcement very seriously,” the Barack Obama appointee said. "Which I suspect you did too, before that day.”
McAbee was charged along with six other Jan. 6 defendants — Jeffrey Sabol, Peter Stager, Michael Lopatic, Jack Whitton, Clayton Mullins and Logan Barnhart — each of whom were involved in a series of vicious attacks against police officers around the Lower West Terrace.
In their sentencing memorandum, Justice Department prosecutors described how McAbee made his way to the tunnel and watched other rioters, including some of his future co-defendants, as they attacked the officers. They knocked one, Metropolitan Police Officer Andrew Wayte, to the ground and dragged him into the crowd by his head.
Contreras described this incident as McAbee pulling Wayte “like a violent game of tug of war, with the officer’s leg as a rope.”
McAbee then made his way toward Wayte, grabbed him by the leg, and pulled them deeper into the mob, striking other officers as they attempted to retrieve Wayte. McAbee pinned him to the ground for 25 seconds as the mob pulled off Wayte's gas mask, sprayed him with mace and continued their assault.
Wayte testified at trial this past October about the injuries he suffered following the assault: a cut to his head that required staples, a concussion, “goose eggs” on his head, and extreme pain from being sprayed in the face.
He was unable to return to work until May 2021 with limited duties, and not to full duty until July 2021.
In a statement before the court, McAbee apologized for his actions, directing his words to Wayte, saying “I was only trying to help.”
Besides his apology, McAbee tried to justify his actions, explaining that his training kicked in when he saw an officer down and he tried to step in but didn’t realize he “was just getting in the way.”
“I understand that I must be held accountable for my actions, but please don’t judge me for the worst 20 minutes of my life,” McAbee said.
McAbee pleaded guilty without a plea deal to two counts for assaulting an officer and for engaging in violence on the Capitol grounds.
He was convicted during a jury trial in October on his remaining five charges of assaulting officers, obstructing law enforcement during a civil disorder, remaining on restricted grounds with a dangerous weapon, disorderly conduct with a dangerous weapon and engaging in physical violence on restricted grounds with a dangerous weapon.
Benjamin Schiffelbein, a federal public defender representing McAbee, urged Contreras to sentence his client below the 151 months the Justice Department prosecutors had requested.
He explained that McAbee’s violent activity was due in part to aggressive conduct by police and that he became enraptured by the mob mentality that made him act irrationally and out of character.
McAbee pointed to his attempt to assist Rosanne Boyland, one of the four rioters who died during the riot, after she had been crushed by a crowd as they were pushed out of the tunnel, as an example of his usual character.
Immediately following his assault on Wayte, McAbee found Boyland lying unconscious near the tunnel, where he performed CPR in an attempt to revive her. When she didn’t regain consciousness, McAbee carried her body to the police line, where officers also tried to revive her to no avail.
Contreras credited McAbee for his efforts but noted that had the mob, and McAbee himself, not been assaulting officers, they could have spent more time assisting those injured rather than trying to hold the line.
In the 37 months since the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, over 1,313 people have been charged in connection to the riot, with 91 pleading guilty to assaulting law enforcement. Approximately 490 defendants have been sentenced to prison terms.
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