Then:
Now:
Another dimbulb MAGAt insurrectionist gets his comeuppance. We're guessing this is the only time he's been first in anything:
A Kentucky man who was the first rioter to enter the U.S. Capitol during a mob’s attack on the building was sentenced on Tuesday to more than four years in prison.
A police officer who tried to subdue Michael Sparks with pepper spray described him as a catalyst for the Jan. 6 insurrection. The Senate that day recessed less than one minute after Sparks jumped into the building through a broken window. Sparks then joined other rioters in chasing a police officer up flights of stairs.
Before learning his sentencing, Sparks told the judge that he still believes the 2020 presidential election was marred by fraud and “completely taken from the American public.”
“I am remorseful that what transpired that day didn’t help anybody,” Sparks said. “I am remorseful that our country is in the state it’s in.”
U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly, who sentenced Sparks to four years and five months, told him that there was nothing patriotic about his prominent role in what was a “national disgrace.”
“I don’t really think you appreciate the full gravity of what happened that day and, quite frankly, the full seriousness of what you did,” the judge said. [snip]
In the weeks leading up to the Jan. 6 attack, Sparks used social media to promote conspiracy theories about election fraud and advocate for a civil war.
“It’s time to drag them out of Congress. It’s tyranny,” he posted on Facebook three days before the riot.
Sparks traveled to Washington, D.C, with co-workers from an electronics and components plant in Elizabethtown, Kentucky. They attended then-President Donald Trump’s “Stop the Steal” rally near the White House on Jan. 6.
After the rally, Sparks and a friend, Joseph Howe, joined a crowd in marching to the Capitol. Both of them wore tactical vests. Howe was captured on video repeatedly saying, “we’re getting in that building.”
Off camera, Sparks added: “All it’s going to take is one person to go. The rest is following,” according to prosecutors. Sparks’ attorney argued that the evidence doesn’t prove that Sparks made that statement.
“Of course, both Sparks and Howe were more right than perhaps anyone else knew at the time — it was just a short time later that Sparks made history as the very first person to go inside, and the rest indeed followed,” prosecutors wrote. [snip]
Undeterred by pepper spray, Sparks joined other rioters in chasing Capitol Police Officer Eugene Goodman as he retreated up the stairs and found backup from other officers near the Senate chamber.
“This is our America!” Sparks screamed at police. He left the building about 10 minutes later...
Now, the real America invites you to enjoy a cell in a real American Federal prison for the next four years. Unrepentant moron.
The FBI is still looking for the insurrectionists who tried to overturn our system of government on January 6, 2021. If you recognize anyone not yet apprehended, do your country a favor and pick up the phone, 1-800-CALL-FBI (800-225-5324), or visit tips.fbi.gov.
(Top photos: Department of Justice; bottom: Sparks on August 27, 2024 / AP Photo/ Mark Schiefelbein)
