‘Self-professed’ white supremacist gets jail for January 6 riot

A self-proclaimed white supremacist will spend time behind bars for his role in the U.S. Capitol riots.

Bryan Betancur was sentenced to four months in jail Wednesday after pleading guilty to illegally trespassing on Capitol grounds.

Prosecutors say Betancur stormed the U.S. Capitol on January 6th and helped rioters remove furniture from the Capitol building while wearing a court-mandated device that tracked his movements, court records show. A GPS-enabled monitoring device that he was wearing under the terms of his probation showed that he spent roughly three hours in or around the Capitol that afternoon.

Prosecutors say Betancur expressed a desire to be a "lone wolf killer" and said his only regret was that he could no longer join the military due to his actions.

The FBI believes Betancur aspired to join the far-right Proud Boys extremist group but wasn’t an official member. He wore a Proud Boys shirt under his jacket on January 6 and met with members of the group before he walked over to the Capitol.

Images recovered from his cellphone showed him in Washington with Proud Boys members on December 12, 2020. Probation officers gave Betancur permission to visit the city that day and on January 6, both times under the pretense that he was traveling with Gideon International to distribute Bibles.

Betancur told law enforcement officers that he was a member of several white supremacy groups and said he wanted to run people over with a vehicle and kill people in a church, an FBI agent wrote in an affidavit.

“Betancur has voiced homicidal ideations, made comments about conducting a school shooting, and has researched mass shootings,” the affidavit said.

Betancur has a significant criminal history which the judge said he took into consideration when handing down his jail sentence.