A Washington DC police officer witnessed riot police using military-style hand signals to communicate inside Capitol Building during the breach on Jan. 6, a law enforcement official reported on CBS News.
Identifying individuals who use small-unit military tactics is one of the “top priorities” of a sedition office run by the DCUS prosecutor’s office. The apparent use of “small unit tactics,” trained for the military and law enforcement, led to an immediate examination by investigators. CBS News has learned that these tactics were face-to-face both outside and inside the Capitol Building.
Federal investigators are reviewing images that appeared on social media, as well as thousands of hours of CCTV video located outside the Supreme Court, the Library of Congress, the Republican National Committee, the Democratic National Committee, the Capitol campus and the police agency. cameras.
Columbia District U.S. Attorney General Michael Sherwin said Tuesday that his office is investigating possible seditious conspiracy charges in his investigation of the riot.
Sherwin said research on riot planning includes reviewing travel records, financial information and communications.
On Thursday, prosecutors said a retired Air Force officer who was arrested in Texas after being featured in a viral photo was wearing plastic zippered handcuffs because he intended to “take hostages.”
“It means taking hostages. It means kidnapping, containing, perhaps attempting, perhaps executing members of the U.S. government,” Deputy Attorney General Jay Weimer said of retired Lt. Col. Larry Rendall Brock Jr., who was also the subject of a new Yorker Article.
Federal authorities have charged more than 40 people in connection with the Capitol riot. Among them were two off-duty police officers from Rocky Mount, Virginia, Jacob Fracker and Thomas Robertson, who face a charge of knowingly entering or remaining in any restricted building or land without legal authority and a charge of ‘violent entry and disorderly conduct. on the grounds of the Capitol.
Fracker is a Virginia National Guard corporal and is not currently on duty with Virginia National Guard troops in Washington, DC. The Virginia National Guard will conduct an investigation.
Prosecutors wrote in a complaint that Robertson wrote in a social media post: “CNN and the left are crazy because we actually attacked the government which is the problem and not some random small businesses … The right ONE DAY took the f * **** U.S. Capitol. It keeps puncturing us. ”
Fracker posted a deleted comment from Facebook that said, “Lol to anyone who’s worried about the image I’m flipping … Excuse me for hating freedom? … Not like I’ve done anything illegal … you all do what you feel, ”according to the complaint.