Off-duty DEA agent with badge arrested in insurrection

An off-duty Drug Enforcement Administration agent posed for photographs in which he flashed his DEA badge and firearm outside the U.S. Capitol during the Jan. 6 riot, according to a court filing Tuesday following the agent’s arrest.

A video posted on the internet also showed Mark Sami Ibrahim carrying a flag bearing the words “Liberty or Death” outside the Capitol, about 12 minutes before a mob of people pulled apart a nearby set of barricades, authorities said.

Ibrahim, of Orange County, California, was a probationary employee of the DEA and was on personal leave from the agency when he traveled to Washington on Jan. 6. Several weeks before the riot, he had given notice of his intent to resign.

Also on Tuesday, a third person pleaded guilty to participating in a plot for members of the anti-government Oath Keepers group to storm the Capitol on Jan. 6. The judge who accepted Caleb Berry’s guilty plea didn’t immediately schedule his sentencing hearing.

The presence of law enforcement at the riot has been troubling for the police who were attacked and beaten.

The DEA agent is among at least 30 officers in 12 states who are being scrutinized for their behavior in the District of Columbia or face criminal charges for participating.

Ibrahim wasn’t working as a law enforcement officer at the Capitol on Jan. 6, but he told investigators after the riot that he was there to help a friend who had been asked to document the event for the FBI.

The friend denied that.