Marines on Active Duty During Capitol Attack Plead Guilty

The two attended the Trump rally, then took photos in the Rotunda
By Newser Editors and Wire Services
Posted Jun 12, 2023 7:05 PM CDT
Marines on Active Duty During Capitol Attack Plead Guilty
In this image from US Capitol Police video, released and annotated by the Justice Department, Joshua Abate, circled in green; Micah Coomer, circled in red; and Dodge Dale Hellonen, circled in blue, appear inside the US Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, in Washington.   (Justice Department via AP)

Two men who were active-duty members of the Marines Corps when they stormed the US Capitol pleaded guilty on Monday to riot-related criminal charges. Joshua Abate and Dodge Dale Hellonen are scheduled to be sentenced in September by US District Judge Ana Reyes. Both pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor count of parading, demonstrating, or picketing in a Capitol building, said a spokesperson for the US Attorney's office for the District of Columbia. Many Capitol rioters are military veterans, but only a few were actively serving in the armed forces when they joined a mob's attack on Jan. 6, 2021, the AP reports.

A third active-duty Marine, Micah Coomer, was charged with Abate and Hellonen. Coomer pleaded guilty to the same misdemeanor charge in May and is scheduled to be sentenced on Aug. 30. All three face a maximum sentence of six months of imprisonment. As of May 19, the Marines were still in the service. David Dischley, an attorney for Abate, declined to comment on his client's guilty plea. An assistant public defender who represents Hellonen didn't immediately respond to an email seeking comment. Authorities arrested the three men in January: Abate at Fort Meade, Maryland; Coomer in Oceanside, California; and Hellonen in Jacksonville, North Carolina. Witnesses stationed with Coomer at Marine Corps Base Quantico in Virginia and with Hellonen at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina identified them in videos of the Jan. 6 riot, according to the FBI. A third witness, also a Marine, identified Abate from footage taken inside the Capitol, the FBI said.

During a June 2022 interview for his security clearance, Abate said he and two "buddies" had walked through the Capitol on Jan. 6 "and tried not to get hit with tear gas," according to an FBI special agent. "Abate also admitted he heard how the event was being portrayed negatively and decided that he should not tell anybody about going into the U.S. Capitol Building," the agent wrote in an affidavit. Coomer drove to Washington on Jan. 6 from his military post in Virginia. He attended then-President Donald Trump's "Stop the Steal" rally with Abate and Hellonen before they entered the Capitol. Inside the Rotunda, they placed a red "Make America Great Again" hat on a statute before taking photos of it, prosecutors said. The three men spent nearly an hour inside the Capitol.

(More Marines stories.)

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