Rioters loyal to President Donald Trump gather at the U.S. Capitol in Washington on January 6, 2021.
Jose Luis Magana/AP
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Jose Luis Magana/AP
WASHINGTON — A California man with a history of political violence was sentenced Friday to 20 years in prison for repeatedly attacking police with flagpoles and other makeshift weapons during the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol.
The sentence handed down to David Nicholas Dempsey is one of the longest of the hundreds of cases he has been charged with over the Capitol riots. Prosecutors have described him as one of the most violent members of the mob of Donald Trump supporters who attacked the Capitol as lawmakers gathered to certify Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 presidential election.
Dempsey, of Van Nuys, stomped on officers’ heads. He swung poles at officers defending a tunnel, hit an officer in the head with a metal crutch and attacked police with pepper spray and pieces of broken furniture, prosecutors said.
He climbed over other rioters, using them as “human scaffolding” to reach police officers guarding a tunnel entrance. He injured at least two officers, prosecutors said.
“Your behavior on January 6 was exceptionally egregious,” federal judge Royce Lamberth told Dempsey. “You did not get caught up in the moment.”
Dempsey pleaded guilty in January to two counts of assaulting police officers with a dangerous weapon.
Only former Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio has received a longer sentence for the January 6 attack. Tarrio was sentenced to 22 years in prison for orchestrating a plot to prevent the peaceful transfer of power from Trump to Joe Biden after the 2020 presidential election.
Dempsey called his conduct “reprehensible” and apologized to the officers he assaulted.
“You were doing your duty, and I responded with hostility and violence,” he said before learning his sentence.
Justice Department prosecutors recommended a prison sentence of 21 years and 10 months for Dempsey, a former construction worker and fast-food restaurant employee. Dempsey’s violence was so extreme that he attacked another rioter who tried to disarm him, prosecutors wrote.
“David Dempsey is political violence personified,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Douglas Brasher told the judge.
Defense attorney Amy Collins, who asked for a sentence of six years and six months, called the government’s recommendation “ridiculous.”
“It makes him a statistic,” she said. “It doesn’t take into account who he is, or how he grew up.”
Dempsey was wearing a tactical vest, helmet and neck gaiter with the American flag over his face when he attacked police in a tunnel leading to the Lower West Terrace gates. He fired pepper spray at Metropolitan Police Department Detective Phuson Nguyen just as another rioter pulled on the officer’s gas mask, prosecutors wrote.
“The hot spray burned Detective Nguyen’s lungs, throat, eyes and face and left him gasping for air, fearing he would lose consciousness and be overwhelmed by the crowd,” they wrote.
Dempsey then struck MPD Sergeant Jason Mastony in the head with a metal crutch, cracking the shield of his gas mask and severing his head.
“I collapsed and grabbed myself against the wall as my ears were ringing. I was able to get up and hold the cordon for a few minutes until a renewed onslaught of rioters pushed the police cordon away from the tunnel threshold,” Mastony said in a statement submitted to the court.
Dempsey has been in jail since his arrest in August 2021.
Dempsey had a history of political violence
His criminal record in California includes convictions for burglary, theft and assault. The assault conviction stems from an October 2019 rally near the Santa Monica Pier, where Dempsey attacked people peacefully protesting against then-President Trump, prosecutors said.
“The peaceful protest turned violent when Dempsey pulled bear spray from his pants and fired it at close range at several protesters,” they wrote, noting that Dempsey was sentenced to 200 days in jail.
Dempsey committed at least three other acts of “vicious political violence” that were not criminally prosecuted “for various reasons,” prosecutors said. They said Dempsey hit a counterprotester in the head with a skateboard at a June 2019 rally in Los Angeles, used the same skateboard to assault someone at an August 2020 protest in Tujunga, California, and attacked a protester with pepper spray and a metal bat at an August 2020 protest in Beverly Hills, California.
More than 1,400 people have been charged with federal crimes related to the events of January 6. More than 900 of them have been convicted and sentenced, with about two-thirds receiving prison sentences ranging from a few days to 22 years, as is the case with Tarrio.
