WASHINGTON — A Donald Trump supporter who attacked law enforcement with bear spray and a metal whip and was arrested thanks to a sting operation on a woman on the dating app Bumble was sentenced Wednesday to just over six years in prison.
Andrew Taake was was arrested In 2021 and admitted his guilt assaulting officers using a deadly or dangerous weapon in December. Previously convicted of a felony and arrested on charges of soliciting a minor during the Capitol attack – Taake one of the few suspects was detained in the prison on January 6.
Prosecutors searched for Taake sentenced to 6.5 years in federal prison. Court giving He also said prosecutors will highlight a disciplinary investigation at the prison in Washington, where Taake is being held, accusing him of “fighting with another inmate on December 14, 2023.”
Taake was sentenced Wednesday to 74 months in prison by U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols — a Trump appointee — on suspicion of obstruction of justice in the Jan. 6 cases. is now a matter before the Supreme Court.
Nichols said Taake’s actions were “as serious as any other defendant I have sentenced on Jan. 6” and “should deter others from similar behavior in the future.” Bear spraying officers and carrying a metal whip, Nichols said, “is the furthest thing from First Amendment expression.”
Taake was scheduled to be sentenced in April, but complications arose after Nichols argued in court that an additional sentencing enhancement should be applied, even though the government is prohibited from publicly arguing for it under the terms of the plea agreement.
Nichols relied on the testimony of one of the officers Taake hit with bear spray. In his victim impact statement, the officer said he was “immediately” but temporarily “blinded” after being shot, and that it was the worst pain he had ever experienced and was “like living death”.
Federal prosecutors alleged in sentencing memos that for nearly three years after his arrest, Taake “continually blamed the victim officers, members of Congress and the media for his Jan. 6 criminal acts.”
“His persistent narrative is that he and other ‘patriots’ were heroes and that he was unjustly the victim of ‘selective persecution.’ “He showed no remorse or acceptance of responsibility for his actions—even after pleading guilty, he went so far as to deny responsibility,” they wrote. began to use violence against other prisoners.”
Assistant U.S. Attorney Madison Mumma said in court Wednesday that Taake committed at least six attacks on Jan. 6, including four with bear spray. Taake said he saw Trump’s election loss as “the beginning of the end for the United States” and vowed to take the fight “directly to the swamp creatures.”
Taake was arrested as a result of an operation launched on the dating app Bumble following the Jan. 6 attack by a young professional working in the nation’s capital.
The woman referred to as “Witness 1” in the FBI affidavit, mentioned before Some “comically minimal ego-stroking” that caused Taake and other January 6 participants not to report their activities during this attack.
“I felt a little bit of ‘civic duty,’ I guess, but to be honest, I was mostly mad and thinking, ‘F— these guys,'” said the woman, who spoke anonymously for fear of online reprisal. The men wanted to “take back” the lies they heard from prominent Republicans about the 2020 presidential election, he said.
The woman’s strategy, he recalled, was to say, “Whoa, crazy, tell me more,” over and over until she had enough time to send it to the FBI.
“It certainly didn’t take much arm-twisting for them to start talking about it. Generally, I’m like, ‘Wow, that’s great – so what? Another?’ “That’s pretty much all it took,” he said.
After Taake’s sentencing Wednesday, the woman told NBC News that she thought the sentence was “solid,” especially since it was from Nichols, and that she was happy to see Taake held accountable.
“I’m glad at least one of the creeps I met on bumble will get jail time,” he wrote in a text message. “I’m glad I was able to help the online scouts who did all the legwork to match this image, but I’m so glad it’s over now and I can stop thinking about this guy! After all this, I am happy to hang up my Shahid 1 hat.”
Speaking before sentencing, Taake, who wore orange in prison, said he was “not a violent, threatening monster” and apologized to the victim officer who was in court.
“I’ve never tried to say I’m innocent,” Taake said. “I looked. I did things I shouldn’t have done.”
Taake said he “saw red” when he committed the attacks and was “caught in the moment”.
More than 1,400 people have been charged in connection with the Capitol attack, and prosecutors have indicted more than 1,000 defendants. About 500 defendants were sentenced to terms ranging from a few days behind bars to 22 years in federal prison.