CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — A West Virginia man has been arrested on charges that he participated in violence during the breach of the U.S. Capitol in January 2021.
John Thomas Gordon, 47, of Bayard, is accused of repeatedly throwing a hard object at a Capitol door as police officers tried to secure the building on the other side of the glass window, according to court documents. Gordon allegedly also kicked the door in order to gain entry and yelled obscenities at officers.
Gordon was arrested Friday in Martinsburg. He is charged in a criminal complaint filed in Washington, D.C., with felony civil disorder and five misdemeanors, including destruction of government property.
It wasn’t immediately known whether Gordon has an attorney who could comment on the charges on his behalf.
According to a statement of facts accompanying the charging documents, Gordon has head tattoos and was identified through photographs on social media, photos and videos of the Capitol insurrection. Gordon admitted to a West Virginia sheriff who conducted an interview of him at his apartment in March 2021 that he had been at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
In August 2021, an FBI special agent interviewed someone who had a romantic relationship with Gordon and was not identified in the documents. That person confirmed it was Gordon in the FBI’s photograph, the statement said.
More than 830 people have been charged with federal crimes related to the Capitol riot. More than 320 of them have pleaded guilty, mostly to misdemeanor charges, and over 200 have been sentenced.
