A former U.S. Army soldier who was convicted of voluntary manslaughter in the killing of an Iraqi civilian in 2004 was charged on Monday with assaulting police officers with a baton during the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol, the Justice Department announced.
The former soldier, Edward Richmond Jr., 40, of Geismar, La., who was arrested on Monday in Baton Rouge, faces several federal charges, including civil disorder; entering and remaining in a restricted area with a deadly or dangerous weapon; and assaulting, resisting or impeding certain officers, prosecutors said.
A spokesman for the U.S. Army, Bryce S. Dubee, confirmed that Mr. Richmond had been convicted of voluntary manslaughter in 2004, the same year he was deployed to Iraq. Mr. Richmond, who was in the Army from 2002 to 2008, was sentenced in military court to a reduction in rank to private, forfeiture of all pay and allowances, three years’ confinement and a dishonorable discharge, Mr. Dubee said.
He was released from prison on parole in 2006 with almost a year remaining on his original sentence, according to The Associated Press.
According to The A.P., Mr. Richmond killed a cow herder who had been detained along with the other men in an Iraqi village near Taal Al Jai that the Army raided on Feb. 28, 2004. The herder, Muhamad Husain Kadir, was handcuffed when Mr. Richmond shot him in the back of the head from six feet away as the man stumbled, The A.P. reported.
In his defense, Mr. Richmond, then 20, said that although he had not seen Mr. Kadir with a weapon, he thought that Mr. Kadir had been lunging to attack another soldier, adding that he didn’t know Mr. Kadir’s hands had been bound, according to the wire service.
In the Justice Department’s announcement on Monday, prosecutors said Mr. Richmond was among a group of about 10 people who traveled from Ohio to Washington, D.C., to attend pro-Trump rallies planned for Jan. 6, when Congress was set to certify the results of the 2020 presidential election at the Capitol.
Investigators identified Mr. Richmond in several images and footage from the Capitol breach on Jan. 6, including on closed-circuit television footage and on video taken by officer body-worn cameras, according to an affidavit written by an F.B.I. agent filed with the criminal complaint in the U.S. District Court in Washington.
Mr. Richmond is seen in images filed in the complaint wearing a black helmet, goggles, shoulder pads and a state of Louisiana flag patch attached to a camouflage-pattern vest.
Closed-circuit television footage shows him amid a crush of rioters near the tunnel at the Capitol. Body-worn camera footage from officers shows him “using a baton to strike law enforcement officers” multiple times, prosecutors said.
Mr. Richmond is scheduled to make an initial appearance in the U.S. Middle District Court of Louisiana on Tuesday at 10 a.m., his lawyer, John McLindon, said. He declined to comment on the case.
So far, federal authorities have charged over 1,265 people in connection with the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the Capitol, including more than 440 who were charged with “assaulting or impeding” police officers, according to the Justice Department.
The department’s efforts have so far resulted in more than 720 convictions, with sentences ranging from mere days to more than 20 years in prison.