Sentencing hearings for Proud Boys Enrique Tarrio, Ethan Nordean canceled after 'emergency'

Aug. 30 (UPI) -- Sentencing hearings for convicted ex-Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio and associate Ethan Nordean slated for Wednesday were canceled shortly before their scheduled start time.

The U.S. Attorney's Office for Washington, D.C., said the hearings were canceled "due to an emergency" but did not elaborate on the nature of the emergency.

Tarrio's hearing was originally scheduled for 10 a.m. and his attorney Nayib Hassan said it was unclear when it would be rescheduled.

The government seeks a 33-year sentence for Tarrio and 27 years for Nordean, which would represent the longest sentences handed down in response to the Jan. 6, 2021, riots at the U.S. Capitol yet.

A jury found the Proud Boys conspired to use force to stop Congress' certification of the 2020 presidential election results.

Seditious conspiracy is when two or more people conspire to "overthrow, put down, or to destroy by force the Government of the United States" or to use force to take U.S. property or hinder, delay or prevent th execution of any law of the United States.

Tarrio and Nordean are facing up to 20 years in prison on that conspiracy charge alone.

"The defendants understood the stakes, and they embraced their role in bringing about a 'revolution.' They unleashed a force on the Capitol that was calculated to exert their political will on elected officials by force and to undo the results of a democratic election. The foot soldiers of the right aimed to keep their leader in power. They failed. They are not heroes; they are criminals," the federal government said in a sentencing memo filed Aug. 17.

The government also wants 33 years in prison for convicted Proud Boy Joseph Biggs, 30 years for Zachary Rehl, and 20 years for Dominic Pezzola.

Pezzola was acquitted of seditious conspiracy but was found guilty of other felonies, including assaulting and resisting police as he smashed a window to enter the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

All were scheduled to be sentenced this week.

Prosecutors said in a court filing that the Proud Boys posed a greater physical threat to democracy than the Oath Keepers.

Oath Keeper leader Stewart Rhodes, sentenced to 18 years in prison, has gotten the longest Jan. 6 insurrection sentence so far.

"Unlike the Oath Keeper defendants, whose numbers were limited to a core group of roughly two dozen men and women," prosecutors wrote. "These defendants led nearly 200 like-minded men onto Capitol grounds, who also engaged in violent attacks on law enforcement and destruction of government property, thus enabling the defendant's calculated attempt to forcibly stop the lawful transfer of power."