SC Trump supporter with ‘troubling’ fixations gets 57 months in prison for Jan. 6 riot

A South Carolina man who helped lead a mob during the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot has been sentenced to 57 months — nearly five years — in prison for attacking police.

Tyler Dykes, of Bluffton, 26, received the sentence Friday morning from U.S. Judge Beryl Howell in in Washington.

It is one of the stiffest sentences to date handed down to any of the 27 South Carolina defendants arrested so far in the aftermath of the Jan. 6 riot by supporters of former President Donald Trump. Approximately 20 have so far pled guilty; other cases are pending.

Prosecutors had sought 63 months in prison. Dykes’ attorneys, William Nettles IV and Edmund Neyle, had asked for 24 months.

Nettles, who declined comment, is the chief federal public defender in South Carolina. Neyle is a lawyer in his office.

A tipster gave information on Dykes to the FBI that led to his arrest. Dykes had worn a neck gaiter over his face while he was at the Capitol to avoid being easily identified, court records said. Other evidence included geolocation data and Dykes’ postings on the internet and statements to others.

Dykes — who at the time of the Jan. 6 riot was 21 and in the U.S. Marine Corps — “violently wrenched a police riot shield out of the hands of officers defending the Capitol and twice used the shield to push his way through police lines during the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, an unprecedented attack that interrupted certification of the Electoral College vote,” prosecutor Samantha Miller wrote in a 43-page sentencing memo to the judge.

In 2017, Dykes had carried a lit torch and performed the Nazi salute with the torchbearers at the white supremacist Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Va., and was charged with burning an object with the intent to intimidate, convicted and served time, Miller wrote.

The aggression on Jan. 6 by Dykes — who at 6-foot-4 towered over most police — forced officers to retreat and helped rioters break through police lines outside the Capitol and force their way into the building, Miller wrote.

Before the riot, Dykes frequented various Telegram channels, discussed allegations of voter fraud and various extremist sentiments, Miller wrote.

“Some of the groups also promoted violence related to Jan. 6, 2021 and advocated violent government overthrow. These discussions included quotations from Hitler and messages including, ‘The time for peace has passed. Hail holy terror. Hail chaos’,“ the postings said.

Dykes’ user names on Telegram were “Rogerup” and “Nocturnal Wolf,” and he saved to his cellphone a symbol known as “Wolfsangel,” which appears similar to a swastika, and “is commonly known to be a logo for neo-Nazis in the United States and Europe,” the prosecutor wrote. One photo of Dykes inside the Capitol appears to show him giving the Nazi salute, the prosecutor wrote.

Dykes came to Washington on Jan. 6 with two friends, and they attended then-President Trump’s “Stop the Steal” rally before the riot. The two friends did not join Dykes in the mob’s Capitol rampage, the prosecutor said.

Dykes was an enthusiastic Trump supporter. “Dykes self-identified as a loyal Trump supporter, who followed politics more than the average citizen. He claimed the election was fraudulent, in large part because then-President Trump said so,” the prosecutor wrote.

Despite Tump’s assertions, no one has produced credible evidence of voting fraud in any state sufficient to overturn the 2020 election, according to former Attorney General William Barr and some 60 court cases.

When interviewed by law enforcement, Dykes’ explanation for his conduct, “especially the more violent conduct, was that it was a ‘hyper environment’ and he became ‘adrenalized’,” the prosecutor wrote.

The defense view

Tyler “is a young man who made incredibly poor decisions on Jan. 6, 2021,” his defense lawyers wrote. He knows his actions were “egregious... unjustifiable, illegal, indefensible and intolerable, ” they wrote.

Tyler was adopted and has various talents, including an ear for music. He plays trumpet and he has won major awards. A straight-A student and and Eagle Scout at North Lincoln High School in Denver, NC, about 25 miles north of downtown Charlotte, he got into Cornell University, an Ivy League school in New York. But he stumbled his freshman year, left Cornell and joined the Marines, his lawyers wrote.

In Bluffton, in recent years, Dykes started his own business, Technology King of the Low Country, which helped elderly retirees with computer problems.

When news of his arrest on Jan. 6 charges surfaced, Dykes’ life and business cratered, his lawyers wrote. Friends deserted him, his church asked him to go elsewhere, his customer base dried up and media companies refused to let him advertise. “Of Tyler’s 15 closest friends, all but three abandoned him,” defense lawyers wrote. They estimated his business losses at $150,000.

“It will take years of endless work before he regains the trust of his friends and community,” defense lawyers wrote.

“Tyler hates his involvement in the Capitol riot,” his lawyers wrote. “He takes complete responsibility for his actions.”

He apologizes to the U.S. Capitol police, the Metropolitan police, to his country and to the court, they wrote.

But the prosecutor showed little mercy.

“Dykes’s family history and education provided him with ample opportunity to succeed and make lawful choices. Dykes has had supportive family, a good education, financial stability, and no significant health issues; his crimes were not crimes driven by poverty, neglect, or abuse,” she wrote.

“Despite his advantages, Dykes’s criminal and other history demonstrate an affinity for violence and, in particular, ideologically-motivated violence.... He was discharged from the U.S. Marine Corps under other than honorable conditions for participating in prohibited activities, namely, ‘participating in extremist behavior’,” the prosecutor wrote.

He had “a troubling fixation with militarization, weapons, violence, and racism,” she wrote.

During the Capitol breach on Jan. 6, rioters injured more than 100 police officers and caused $2.9 million worth of damage.

The cases of nearly all of the more than 1,450 people arrested so far in the Jan. 6 Capitol riot are being handled by judges in Washington. It is the largest investigation in the history of the Department of Justice. The FBI is investigating.. The investigation is still ongoing.