Monitoring Desk
WASHINGTON: American far-right anti-government militia, Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes and another leader were found guilty of seditious conspiracy for the attack on the US Capitol in 2021 by former US president Donald Trump supporters.
The verdict by a 12-member jury is seen as an important win for the US Justice Department.
The verdict against Rhodes and four co-defendants of the right wing was announced after three days of deliberations by the jury in the highest-profile trial.
On January 6, 2021, the right-wing supporters carried out a deadly attack on the US Capitol, after Trump’s defeat in the 2020 elections.
US Oath Keepers founder Stewart
Rhodes, a Yale Law School-educated and a former army paratrooper and dismissed attorney, was accused by prosecutors during the eight-week trial of plotting to use force to attempt to block Congress from certifying President Joe Biden’s election victory over Trump. Rhodes was convicted on three counts while acquitted on two counts.
One of his co-defendants and member of the right-wing Kelly Meggs was also found guilty of seditious conspiracy. Similarly, the three others, Kenneth Harrelson, Jessica Watkins and Thomas Caldwell were acquitted of that charge.
All five defendants including Rhodes were convicted of obstruction of an official proceeding — the congressional certification of the election results.
The charges of seditious conspiracy and obstruction of an official proceeding each carry a sentence of up to 20 years in prison.
