A military police officer stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6. That is unacceptable | Mike Kelly

Just in time for Veterans Day, the law finally caught up with Gregory Yetman.

The story of Yetman, 47, of Helmetta Township, a mile-square patch of flatland in the middle of New Jersey, is twofold. One part is mystery. The other part, tragedy.

Let’s begin with the tragedy here.

On Jan. 6, 2021, Yetman made his way to Washington, D.C., to participate in Donald Trump’s bogus “Stop the Steal" rally, which turned into a full-blown attack on the U.S. Capitol. Photos circulated by the FBI show Yetman wearing a black stocking cap and a green and black jacket, with a neck gaiter that he used at one point to cover his face.

After the speeches by Trump and other election deniers near the White House, Yetman made his way to the U.S. Capitol with thousands of other protesters.

The FBI, acting on video information supplied by an online group of researchers that calls itself “Sedition Hunters,” found not only that Yetman illegally entered the Capitol’s restricted area but that he assaulted police by grabbing a canister of “chemical irritant” and spraying it into the eyes of the cops.

FBI agents, assisted by local police — including a SWAT Team — showed up at Yetman’s home in Helmetta on Nov. 8. But Yetman reportedly escaped by scurrying out the back door and into the woods.

On Nov. 10, Yetman turned himself in to police in nearby Monroe Township. On Monday, he made an initial appearance in U.S. District Court in New Jersey and was jailed without bail on a string of federal felony charges including assaulting, resisting or impeding police and obstruction of law enforcement during civil disorder, as well as misdemeanor charges of illegally entering the Capitol's restricted area and engaging in physical violence.

By the way, did I mention that at the time of the Capitol attack Yetman was a military police sergeant with the New Jersey National Guard? He was honorably discharged from the Guard in March 2022 — 14 months after the Capitol attack. One of his deployments included a stint at the U.S. Naval Base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, which houses a variety of alleged Islamist terrorists, some linked to the 9/11 attacks.

Sometimes tragedy is framed by irony — in this case, a tale of a soldier-cop who is charged with attacking his nation and its police officers carrying out their duty to certify the next commander in chief.

Yes, you heard that right: A soldier, who had taken the oath to protect and defend the U.S. Constitution and whose military specialty was policing, now stands accused of viciously attacking police at the Capitol who were merely trying to protect U.S. senators and members of the House of Representatives in performing their constitutional duty to certify a presidential election. At Guantanamo Bay, Yetman guarded a prison with alleged terrorists. Now he’s behind bars, accused of being a domestic terrorist.

And one more thing:  After raiding his home, the Middlesex County prosecutor added an additional charge: illegal possession of large-capacity ammunition.

Why did Gregory Yetman do it?

But let’s not overlook the mystery that leaves such a bitter aftertaste here: Why did a National Guard sergeant — a military police officer, no less — attack other officers at one of the nation’s most sacred buildings?

We may never know what drove Yetman over this mysterious emotional, moral and political cliff.

Did he just get caught up in the moment? Did he watch too much Fox News and actually believe the idiot winds that swirled around Trump, his gang of sycophants and alleged journalists like Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity? Did he buy their lies about all those votes being rigged in the 2020 presidential election? Did he somehow think he was a true patriot? And, if the additional charge against him proves to be true, what in the world was he doing with “large-capacity ammunition”?

Who knows?  But we do know this: Yetman was not the only cop or soldier — active duty or veteran — to participate in the Jan. 6 attacks.

Various studies of the more than 1,000 people charged so far with various crimes linked to the attack found that between 10% and 20% had some type of military or policing background.

Investigative report: Military told FBI of Capitol riot suspect after Jan. 6 attack. He remained free for years

Soon after the attacks, National Public Radio reported that about one in five of the attackers were ex-military. That number seems high — or at least unproven. More recently, a study by George Washington University lowered that number to about 12%.

Perhaps even more significant, the groups that played key roles in leading the attack — the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers — were loaded with military veterans. At least 26 of the 98 members of the Proud Boys charged in the Capitol attack were veterans. The Oath Keepers requires all members to prove their military or policing backgrounds before joining.

Why were there so many veterans and cops involved in the Jan. 6 riot?

The link between the Jan. 6 attempted coup and the U.S. military may turn out to be one of the great mysteries yet to be solved. Yes, FBI agents and federal prosecutors have diligently worked to catch the key culprits of that sad day. But what's unknown is how — and why — so many were veterans and ex-cops.

In a 2021 article in the Journal of Veterans Studies, Eric Hodges, a Marine veteran and now a professor of political science at Longwood University in Virginia, concluded that the veterans who were arrested “believed they were acting patriotically.” But Hodges, whose study carries the ominous title “Storming the Castle,” concluded that closer examination of statements by veterans who were arrested indicates that their “motivations were more consistent with nationalism than patriotism.”

Hodges also found that “military training and combat exposure” of veterans “along with the ‘Stop the Steal’ rhetoric, particularly comments made by former President Donald Trump, played a role in influencing the veterans.”

As a final warning, Hodges said the attack “should be classified as a form of proto-sectarian violence and should serve as a cautionary tale against the growing divisiveness that sparked this incident.”

What to know: The investigation, the charges and the two-day manhunt for Jan. 6 suspect Gregory Yetman

But what should we make of Greg Yetman's story?

This brings us to Greg Yetman.

For months after the Jan. 6 attacks, as video surfaced, no one knew the name of the stocky, bearded man in the black stocking cap and green and black jacket who happened to find a canister of chemical irritants — basically pepper spray — on the grounds of the riot at the Capitol. Initially, the FBI labeled him only as suspect “278 AFO” — with AFO an abbreviation for “assault on a federal officer.”

After examining various photographs and posts on social media, a USA TODAY investigation concluded that “278 AFO” was Yetman. Reporters from USA TODAY confronted Yetman. He admitted to attending the march on the Capitol on Jan. 6, but said he did nothing wrong.

“Everything’s been resolved, everything’s good,” he said.

The FBI version offers a much different narrative.

Around 2:30 p.m. on Jan. 6, Yetman allegedly picked up the spray canister on the Capitol grounds and, according to federal authorities, “with his gaiter covering the lower portion of his face, pointed the canister at police officers and pulled the trigger, sending a long stream of OC pepper spay in the direction of multiple law enforcement officers.”

This was no quick squirt, by the way. The FBI says Yetman sprayed the officers for 14 seconds. In case anyone wonders, 14 seconds is an eternity when you are spraying someone's eyes with a "chemical irritant."

That wasn’t the end to Yetman's alleged activities, however.

The FBI concluded that “additional photographs and video” showed Yetman “walking around other areas within the restricted perimeter of the U.S. Capitol grounds including the Lower West Terrance near the Tunnel entrance” which was the scene of some of the most intense fighting between police and attackers.

As a creepy coda to his exploits that day, Yetman then took to social media and blamed the Jan. 6 chaos on Black Lives Matter activists and “a plethora of idiots from various groups and political parties.”

Well, at least Yetman got that last part right. The Jan. 6 attack was the work of a “plethora of idiots.”

The tragedy for the rest of America is that far too many of those “idiots” once wore a military uniform.

Mike Kelly is an award-winning columnist for NorthJersey.com, part of the USA TODAY Network, as well as the author of three critically acclaimed nonfiction books and a podcast and documentary film producer. To get unlimited access to his insightful thoughts on how we live life in the Northeast, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.

Email: kellym@northjersey.com

This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Gregory Yetman: NJ Jan. 6 suspect was military police officer