Federal prosecutors rested their case Thursday in the trial of a Maine man charged with violent acts in the storming of the U.S. Capitol after hearing extensive testimony from the three officers he is accused of assaulting.
Kyle Fitzsimons, 38, of Lebanon, faces 11 charges for his role in the attempted insurrection on Jan. 6, 2021, including two counts of bodily injury against an officer and one count of attempting to assault an officer with a dangerous or deadly weapon.
The FBI released this photograph of Kyle Fitzsimons during the Capitol insurrection on Jan. 6, 2021, in court documents. The image is taken from a security camera at the Capitol. Federal court documents
Fitzsimons waived his right to a jury trial and his case will be decided by U.S. District Judge Rudolph Contreras.
In the past few days, in a courtroom in Washington, Contreras also has heard testimony from federal investigators who placed Fitzsimons at the Capitol on Jan. 6, congressional staffers who described threatening voicemails they received from him and a woman in his community in Maine who described Fitzsimons as “intense” and “passive-aggressive.”
Prosecutors and Fitzsimons’ court-appointed attorney, Natasha Taylor-Smith, will deliver closing arguments on Friday.
Taylor-Smith has said this week that Fitzsimons was in D.C. following reports of election fraud from “mainstream” news sources, and members of Congress whom he understood were planning to vote against certifying the results of the 2020 general election.
“He was still being told by these same mainstream individuals, and by the chief executive officer of this nation, that there was a plan,” Taylor-Smith said during her opening statement on Tuesday. “That plan did not include the military. It did not include violence or weapons of any kind. All that needed to happen was for the state legislatures to come together on Jan. 6 and object to the certification.”
Federal prosecutors accuse Fitzsimons of assaulting Sgt. Aquilino Gonell of the Capitol Police, and Detective Phuson Nguyen and Officer Sarah Beaver of the Metropolitan Police Department – as well as a number of other officers in a line that Fitzsimons charged with his fists waving.
Nguyen told the court on Tuesday that Fitzsimons pulled off his gas mask while another demonstrator aimed what appeared to be bear spray at his face. He said Fitzsimons then released the mask, trapping his sprayed, burning face behind it as he choked.
“In my head, I thought that was it for me,” he said Tuesday.
Beaver, who testified on Wednesday, said that she had already been vomited on and struck by a can of bear spray while defending the Capitol when she was hit in the helmet by an unstrung bow.
She didn’t see who threw it, but prosecutors showed video and still photos of Fitzsimons that they say make it clear it was his doing.
“There were officers gagging, there were officers laying down, there were officers trying to help other officers …” Beaver testified. “They were throwing all kinds of stuff at us.”
Gonell testified Wednesday that Fitzsimons pulled his shoulder so hard that he needed surgery for torn tissue, calling it “definitely one of the worst pains I’ve felt in my life.”
In her cross examination of the officers, Taylor-Smith had them review still images from surveillance and body camera footage, and said it wasn’t always clear that Fitzsimons was the rioter at fault.
With Gonell specifically, Taylor-Smith twice has tried to restrict or limit his testimony, saying it is not credible. She has accused him of making contradictory statements to news outlets and investigators. Before resuming her cross-examination of Gonell on Thursday morning, she asked Contreras to sanction him, saying she thought she saw him violate the court’s rules by speaking about his testimony with a journalist.
“I can’t imagine – but maybe I’m wrong – that conversation was about anything other than the Jan. 6 trial,” Taylor-Smith said.
Prosecutors said Thursday morning they had reviewed a video of the encounter on social media, and that Gonell had not participated in any interviews about his testimony. In fact, they said, he was harassed by a bystander when he left the courthouse, and that he made a comment about that to a video journalist who had his camera on a trip outside.
Gonell later denied Taylor-Smith’s accounts in a statement to Contreras.
Before Fitzsimons’ trial, Taylor-Smith wrote in court filings that Gonell has contradicted himself in public statements. She tried to subpoena an unedited version of a CNN interview that the network refused to provide. The judge denied the request.
While cross-examining Gonell, Taylor-Smith had the officer review various still images from body camera footage and surveillance footage, arguing Fitzsimons wasn’t the only demonstrator who grabbed at Gonell and his shield.
But Gonell told Taylor-Smith she was only showing him cherry-picked moments from the video. He insisted it was Fitzsimons who injured him.
“I know because I lived it,” Gonell said. “You’re not choosing the whole clip.”
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