Zachariah Settler (via FBI court filing).
A rioter who bragged that he “threw up on the Capitol” has pleaded guilty to breaching the building during the Jan. 6 attack.
Zachariah Sattler, of Maryland, was seen among the crowd of Donald Trump supporters both inside and outside the Capitol building that day. According to prosecutors, he entered the building at around 2:40 p.m. near the Capitol Rotunda with a wave of Donald Trump supporters angry over Joe Biden winning the 2020 presidential election.
Once inside, he “shouted, celebrated, and urged the crowd to move further inside” the building, according to the probable cause affidavit for Sattler’s arrest. Surveillance footage showed Sattler exiting and entering the Rotunda, apparently making friends and taking pictures.
“SATTLER walked through and looked at various items in Statuary Hall, appeared to pray in front of the Nebraska statue, interacted with and hugged an unknown individual, and used this individual’s camera to take a photograph of the individual posing with the Nebraska statue,” the affidavit says.
The court filing also notes that while Sattler was taking the picture, “a group of law enforcement officers sprinted past him” in the direction that he had been walking.
Sattler, who “continued to gesture in a celebratory manner,” meandered in the area of Statuary Hall for a few moments before reentering the Rotunda.
He then “got down and kissed the ground,” the affidavit says, before walking through the room and sitting on a sofa against a wall. An apparently restless Sattler got up almost immediately and continued to wander in and out of the Rotunda, where he “lingered in or around a group of people,” according to the affidavit.
Around 3:00 p.m., he reentered the Rotunda again. He “took several puffs from another individuals’ cigarette, joint or similar object, before returning it to him/her,” the affidavit says. Minutes later, he allegedly approached a door on the east side of the building, spoke briefly with a law enforcement officer, and “physically assisted several individuals through the door inside the building.”
At that point, the affidavit says, Sattler left the building, having spent around 20 minutes inside.
Like numerous other convicted Jan. 6 rioters, Sattler’s own documenting of his time at the Capitol turned out to be his downfall. According to the affidavit, Sattler is seen on video marching toward the Capitol after Trump’s so-called “Stop the Steal” rally near the White House.
“There’s that b—- a– Capitol Building with all them dirty motherf—–s in it,” he is heard saying on the video. He also reportedly said he wanted to “go hang out with the Proud Boys for a minute,” referring to the extremist group whose leaders and members are currently on trial for seditious conspiracy.
“[T]hey dones bustin’ through the gate, we’re going to the motherf—–g Capitol Building!” he is also heard saying, according to prosecutors, as he walks past overturned barriers and signs that indicated the area was closed.
“In another video, SATTLER stood near a Capitol Building entrance and stated: ‘Son of the revolution SATTLERs’ and moments later zoomed in on his own vomit and bragged that he ‘threw up on the Capitol,”” the affidavit says.
He pleaded guilty Thursday to one count of parading, demonstrating, or picketing in a Capitol building, a misdemeanor with a statutory maximum six-month jail sentence. He had originally been charged with four trespassing and disorderly conduct misdemeanors that carried a combined maximum of three years behind bars.
The violent breach forced Congress to stop its certification of Biden’s electoral win, while lawmakers and Capitol staffers either fled the building or sheltered in place for hours.
Senior U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth, a Ronald Reagan appointee, set sentencing for June 29.
Read the affidavit in support of Sattler’s arrest here.
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