Polk City man sentenced to 18 months in prison for role in U.S. Capitol attack
The first Polk County resident convicted on charges related to the U.S. Capitol attack is headed to prison.
Joshua Doolin of Polk City received an 18-month sentence Wednesday in Washington, D.C., five months after U.S. District Judge Carl J. Nichols found him guilty of one felony and three misdemeanors for his presence at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Nichols also ordered 36 months of supervised release after Doolin's term is completed.
Doolin, who had waived his right to a jury trial, was convicted of civil disorder, entering and remaining in a restricted building or grounds, disorderly and disruptive conduct in a restricted building or grounds and theft of government property. He is one of six current or former Polk County residents indicted on charges connected to the U.S. Capitol riot.
Federal prosecutors had recommended a 30-month prison sentence in a sentencing memorandum filed Sunday. Doolin's lawyer had asked Nichols to spare Doolin any prison time and sentence him only to home detention and community service.
Nichols ordered Doolin to pay $175 in fees but imposed no fine. The court order posted late Wednesday afternoon did not indicate when Doolin will report to prison.
Doolin, now 25, traveled to Washington, D.C., to protest the 2020 presidential election results along with relatives and friends, according to the prosecution. The government sentencing memorandum included new details about his activities during the hours he spent outside the Capitol after attending a rally for supporters of former President Donald Trump at the Ellipse.
In the 45-page memo, Assistant U.S. Attorney Benet J. Kearney argued that Doolin went to Washington in 2021 intending to join in a show of force on Trump's behalf as members of Congress were meeting to certify Joe Biden’s election victory. Doolin was an “active” and “enthusiastic" participant in the attack on the Capitol, the prosecutor wrote.
Ready to die on Jan. 6
The memo quotes from messages Doolin wrote before Jan. 6 about plans to attend the “Stop the Steal” rally led by former President Trump. He wrote to his father that he expected to take a semi-automatic rifle to Washington and that his cousin, Jonathan Pollock, would bring magazines. His father, who apparently did not make the trip, replied: “Put it in a case for travel. … If y’all join up with a group like the proud boys y’all might be able to open carry.”
The Proud Boys are a far-right militant organization, some of whose leaders have been convicted of seditious conspiracy in relation to the Capitol attack. The government has not asserted that Doolin was a member of the group.
Doolin did not take a gun to the Capitol, but Kearney wrote that the exchange “is illustrative of his mindset in traveling to Washington, D.C.: He contemplated not only a show of support for President Trump, but a show of force.”
Also: Judge finds Polk County man guilty for actions at U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6
The memo also quoted an exchange between Doolin and a friend on Jan. 6, Doolin’s 23rd birthday. He texted that he “wouldn’t mind dying with my family storming the capital on my birthday!”
Others in Doolin’s group, including his cousins, Jonathan and Olivia Pollock, have been charged with assaulting police officers at the Capitol. Though Doolin did not face such a charge, the memo argues that he took part in violent attempts to breach the Capitol building, advancing several feet inside the Lower West Terrace tunnel.
Doolin “joined a mass of rioters pushing against a police line in a narrow corridor leading from the inaugural stage to the interior of the Capitol building,” Kearney wrote.
The memo cited videos that Doolin recorded during the hours while police officers grappled with rioters. He repeatedly described what was happening as a “revolution,” the memo said. While recording images of a media tower, he yelled, “This is the revolution! That was theirs! That was their tower! That was all theirs!. ... When your kids ask you where you were on January 6, 2021, tell them you helped take America back!”
At another point, the memo said, Doolin recorded himself saying, “We’re taking our Capitol back, baby!”
While on the Upper West Terrace, Doolin stole a U.S. Capitol Police officer’s riot shield, the memo said. After declaring in a video, “I got a riot shield,” Doolin returned to the tunnel and used the shield to push against officers struggling to keep rioters out of the Capitol, the memo said.
Doolin kept the shield as a souvenir, bringing it back to Lakeland, where he and friends signed it and displayed it at the Pollocks’ house, according to the memo.
“Through his actions, Doolin showed that he was not a passive observer of the attack on the Capitol, but rather an excited participant, who strove to be at the front and center of the action,” the memo said. “Although Doolin did not personally touch the police officers in the Tunnel, he was part of a mob that did, and himself aided the rioters that did make direct contact.”
FBI searching for Lakeland's Olivia Pollock days before scheduled trial on Jan. 6 charges
Prosecution: No remorse
In the filing, the prosecutor wrote that Doolin has shown an “utter lack of remorse.” Kearney also asserted that Doolin repeatedly lied in interviews with federal investigators and at his trial. Doolin claimed in an FBI interview that he had been trying to enter the Capitol because he had heard others say a girl inside was injured and needed assistance.
Doolin had recently been hired by Polk County as an emergency medical technician. (He was fired soon after his arrest on June 30, 2021.)
Doolin also said that he considered taking an assault rifle to Washington to hunt or target shoot with his father during the trip, that he did not see any barriers or signs indicating a restricted area as he approached the Capitol and that he did not see any rioters behaving violently, though he had shot video of others fighting with police officers, the memo said.
In addition, Doolin testified that he did not recognize the riot shield as belonging to a police officer, though it bore an official emblem and the words “United States Capitol Police.”
“Doolin’s insistence, through trial, that his presence at the Capitol was peaceful and that he witnessed no violence that day further highlights how little respect Doolin has for the democratic process, for the duties law enforcement performed that day, and for this Court,” Kearney wrote.
In the memo filed Sunday, Kearney wrote that a 30-month sentence reflected the midpoint of the guideline range calculated by the government. He also asked for three years of probation, $2,256.65 in restitution, a $4,052 fine and a $175 mandatory assessment.
Lawyer sought home detention
Doolin’s lawyer, Allen H. Orenberg of Potomac, Maryland, submitted a memo asking Nichols to spare his client any time in prison. Orenberg suggested a sentence of six months of home detention with work release privileges and 150 hours of community service.
More: Lakeland woman who entered US Capitol during Jan. 6 riot accepts plea deal
In the memo, Orenberg challenged many of the prosecution's assertions, asking Nichols to strike sentences and paragraphs from the government’s memo. He wrote that the prosecutor unfairly introduced facts from the prosecution of Michael Perkins, a co-defendant from Plant City convicted of more serious charges.
Orenberg wrote that the barriers outside the Capitol had already been displaced by the time Doolin arrived. He said that Doolin denied stealing the riot shield and should not have to pay restitution for it.
Responding to the prosecutor’s claims of Doolin lying at his trial, Orenberg wrote that Doolin “did not willfully attempt to obstruct or impede the administration of justice” but only “wanted to exercise his constitutional right to explain to the Court his actions on January 6, 2021.”
Orenberg wrote that Doolin had no criminal history before Jan. 6 except for six minor traffic citations. He said Doolin had little interest in politics but “did believe that there were irregularities with the 2020 presidential election which garnered his attention.”
The lawyer denied that Doolin engaged in “significant planning” before the Capitol attack, writing that he intended only to participate in the “Stop the Steal Rally” on the Ellipse before spontaneously deciding to proceed to the Capitol. He described Doolin’s behavior on Jan. 6 as “aberrant” and cited his “youthful” age of 23 at the time.
“There is no dispute that Mr. Doolin’s criminal convictions are serious and will likely have irreparable unintended consequences,” Orenberg wrote. “Any prison term would nonetheless be an inappropriate sentence for Mr. Doolin.”
The defense memo included a video with statements from Doolin, his wife, his mother, his current employer and a friend. Orenberg included a letter from Sarah Doolin of Lakeland, Joshua’s sister-in-law. She wrote that Doolin, the married father of an infant son, “has always been kind, honest, friendly and possesses a tender heart toward others, particularly toward little ones and those more vulnerable.”
She added: “Our nation and world need good men, kind men, honest men, strong men, sacrificial men. Joshua is every one of these, and I ask that you consider this in your sentencing.”
Now that Doolin has be issued a prison sentence, Orenberg asked for a recommendation that he be held in the Tampa area, allowing his family to visit him without financial hardships.
Three of Doolin’s original co-defendants — Jonathan Pollock, Olivia Pollock and Joseph Hutchinson III — are fugitives being sought by the FBI. Jonathan Pollock vanished before an FBI raid at his family's property in the Kathleen area in 2021. Olivia Pollock and Hutchinson removed their GPS monitors and fled just before their trials were scheduled to begin in March. All three are being sought by the FBI.
Gary White can be reached at gary.white@theledger.com or 863-802-7518. Follow on X @garywhite13.
This article originally appeared on The Ledger: Polk City man gets 18-month prison sentence for role in Capitol attack
