A man who joked about storming the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, with a can of beer in his hand said Friday that he regretted his actions.
They were “stupid posts that were never meant to be taken seriously,” Thomas Paul Conover, 53, of Keller, Tex., said in federal court in Washington, D.C., before being sentenced for illegally demonstrating in the Capitol. “I now realize it was extremely inappropriate.” He said he was “ashamed” to be “forever entwined” with the violence of the day — “it’s not who I am.”
Conover recorded himself throughout the riot and posed for photographs inside with a can of beer. Outside, he announced on video, “I don’t always storm the Capitol of the United States of America, but when I do, I prefer Coors Light.”
He was “wandering around with his empty beer can” in “a sacred space,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Sean Murphy told the judge.
Judge Florence Y. Pan ordered Conover to spend 30 days in a halfway house, 36 months on probation, perform 60 hours of community service and pay a $2,500 fine.
3 Chicago men have pleaded guilty in the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Cody Vollan of Flossmoor, Anthony Carollo of Lockport and Jeremiah Carollo of downstate Glen Carbon admitted to a judge they climbed through a broken window of the U.S. Capitol and walked around near House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s offices.
They pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor- parading, picketing or demonstrating in a Capitol building. Sentencing will be in September. The FBI focused on the three when it found their cellphone signals and pictures inside the Capitol that were consistent with their driver’s license photos.