Messages Between D.C Cop & Proud Boys Chief Revealed
Supply: EVA MARIE UZCATEGUI / Getty
Federal prosecutors revealed messages {that a} D.C. police officer exchanged with the chief of the Proud Boys earlier than the January sixth riot throughout his trial.
On Wednesday (Feb.fifteenth) within the trial of the far-right group’s chief, Henry “Enrique” Tarrio, and 4 associates, prosecutors for the federal authorities introduced a sequence of textual content messages between him and Metropolitan Police Lt. Shane Lamond. These messages included inside data that Lamond shared with Tarrio. Lamond was an intelligence officer with the Metropolitan Police tasked with investigating the group, and a 23-year veteran of the drive.
One trade on December 18th, 2020 featured Lamond asking Tarrio if he had known as in an nameless tip claiming his duty in burning a Black Lives Matter banner taken from a traditionally Black church in downtown Washington D.C. after a Trump rally. Tarrio responded that he had executed “greater than that”, confirming he shared the deed on social media. On the identical day, Tarrio had expressed to different Proud Boys members that he “obtained the bounce on the narrative” on the burning in an effort to make it troublesome to cost him with a hate crime. He cited his “contact at DC Metro”, advising these members to maintain the information to themselves. Tarrio would additionally get phrase that he was to be arrested on January 4th, 2021, altering the settings in his chat with Lamond to have messages “self-destruct”.
One other startling trade occurred per week later as Lamond knowledgeable Tarrio that he had ID’d Tarrio to the prison investigation division in a photograph the chief had posted to Parler. “They could be submitting an arrest warrant to the U.S. Lawyer’s workplace,” he wrote. Justice Division prosecutor Conor Mulroe requested FBI Particular Agent Peter Dubrowski if he had ever noticed legislation enforcement disclosing delicate data in that method, to which Dubrowski replied, “I’ve by no means heard of it. I see no profit [to law enforcement].” Sabino Jauregui, Tarrio’s lawyer, stated to the decide when the jury was eliminated that additional exploration of Lamond’s texts would present that Tarrio supplied heavy data to federal and native authorities to assist stem the injury from the riots on January sixth.
In an announcement launched that day, Lamond’s lawyer Mark Schamel stated that the officer (who was positioned on administrative depart in February 2022) aided in Tarrio’s arrest for the banner burning and that his job “was acceptable and at all times targeted on the safety of the residents of Washington, DC.”
