Jeffrey Scott Brown, a 56-year-old Santa Ana man who assaulted police with pepper spray during the storming of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, was sentenced to 4 1/2 years in prison, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.
Brown was sentenced to 54 months in federal prison for felony and misdemeanor charges related to the mob attack by President Donald Trump’s most unhinged Trumpers.
More than 1,000 Trumpers have been arrested, including more than 320 people who have been charged with assaulting or impeding law enforcement. The Trumpers attempted to stop the U.S. Congress from certifying presidential election results for Joe Biden, a Democrat.
Brown and two co-defendants were found guilty at a trial last December. One of the other co-defendants, Peter J. Schwartz of Uniontown, Pennsylvania, is set to be sentenced in May. It was not known why the remaining co-defendant, Markus Maly of Fincastle, Virginia, was not sentenced on Friday as was originally scheduled.
Brown dove toward the front of a makeshift police line and used a stolen can of pepper spray on officers that was handed to him by Schwartz, on January 6.
The Federal prosecutors fought for a sentence of 70 months but his defense attorney, Samuel C. Moore, asked for 40 months in prison. The eventual sentence of 54 months appears to have been a negotiated midpoint.
Moore argued that the Brown’s conduct accounted for “less than 10 minutes of Mr. Brown’s life” and the alleged pepper spray misfired as it “did not make contact with any specific victim.” However Moore conceded that Brown admits he should never have been in the Capitol tunnel that day and that he takes responsibility for doing so.
While the City of Santa Ana is now overwhelmingly Democrat Brown is proof that there are still a few hard core Republicans left in Orange County’s seat. The County as a whole has in recent years shifted from red to purple.
