20-Year-Old Going to Jail After Pleading Guilty to Assault During Capitol Riot

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - A 20-year-old North Carolina man who sprayed a chemical irritant at police officers and broke a window at the US Capitol with a baseball bat during the January 6 riot is going to jail after he pleaded guilty to assault, US media report.

The US Department of Justice said on Thursday that Aiden Henry Bilyard, 20, of Cary, North Carolina, pleaded guilty in the District of Columbia to assaulting law enforcement officers with a dangerous weapon (chemical spray). Bilyard was 18 at the time of the attack.

CBS reported on Friday that Federal Judge Reggie Walton dismissed pleas from Bilyard's attorneys to allow him to return home ahead of his sentencing, immediately sending Bilyard to jail.

"Eighteen is old enough to know right from wrong," Walton said on Friday, as quoted by the Raleigh News & Observer.

Bilyard was arrested in November of last year and faces up to 20 years in federal prison. He will be sentenced in February, 2023, according to the US Department of Justice.

According to NBC, Bilyard was in Air Force basic training when he was questioned by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in August, 2021.

On January 6, a group of supporters of former President Donald Trump breached the Capitol complex in a bid to try and stop Congress from certifying the 2020 election results that Trump said were fraudulent. Hundreds of individuals have since been charged with crimes related to the riot.