In this background photo, court records depict footage of Jack Wade Whitton, center and inset, using a metal crutch to assault police officers at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
A Georgia man was sentenced for assaulting an officer defending the U.S. Capitol during the Jan. 6, 2021, riots, hitting him repeatedly with a metal crutch and dragging him head-first into an angry mob of rioters who beat him with a baton and flagpole.
Jack Wade Whitton, 33, was sentenced to 57 months in prison and 36 months of supervised release. He was also ordered to pay $2,000 in restitution. Whitton pleaded guilty in September to one count of assaulting, resisting, or impeding certain officers with a deadly or dangerous weapon.
U.S. District Judge Rudolph Contreras upbraided Whitten after seeing the videos of the violence, NBC News’ Ryan Reilly reported. “Those videos were gruesome,” said Contreras, a Barack Obama appointee. “You really went out of control.”
Whitton expressed remorse, according to The Associated Press.
“I tell you with confidence: I have changed,” Whitton told the judge, the wire service reported.
Whitton’s defense attorney said in court documents that he went to Washington at his girlfriend’s request after their initial plans to go see her father in Florida fell through.
“Although not interested in former President Trump or politics, Mr. Whitton acquiesced,” the lawyer, Komron Jon Maknoon, wrote in his memo in aid of sentencing.
Without a plan, he and his girlfriend booked a hotel in the Capitol Hill area, learned about the rally, “purchased Trump attire,” and “numerous mini bottles of Fireball alcohol to drink throughout the day.”
“On the morning of January 6, 2021, Mr. Whitton woke up and took his prescribed Vyvanse,” the lawyer wrote. “Prior to walking to the area of the ellipse, Mr. Whitton purchased numerous mini bottles of Fireball alcohol to drink throughout the day. He quickly learned that it was a longer than expected walk to the ellipse, and he was unaccustomed to the cold. Uninterested in the day’s events but trying to be a good boyfriend, Mr. Whitton drank less for entertainment and more to simply get through the cold and speeches at the ellipse.”
Court documents spell out Whitton’s actions that day when thousands of Donald Trump supporters stormed the Capitol.
At one point, Whitton kicked at officers, struck a riot shield, and shouted, “You’re gonna die tonight!”
He climbed a wall between the Lower West Terrace and the Upper West Terrace and threw something at the line of officers before throwing a punch at them.
Afterward, he posted to social media and texted before he was arrested on April 1, 2021, in Georgia.
In one post, he shared images of his bloodied hands, stating, “This is from a bad cop … I fed him to the people. Idk his status. And I don’t care tbh.”
In the government’s sentencing memo, prosecutors asked for the court to sentence him to 97 months, the top of the guideline range.
Prosecutors said Whitton “seized the opportunity for violence, igniting an eruption of mayhem and violence that other rioters quickly joined.”