Target of Jan. 6 conspiracy theory sentenced
WASHINGTON — Ray Epps, the former Donald Trump supporter who became a target of a conspiracy theory that he was an undercover government agent who helped to instigate the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, was sentenced Tuesday to a year of probation for his small role in the riot instead of the six months in prison that prosecutors had requested.
The probation sentence, imposed after Epps had pleaded guilty last year to a single count of disorderly conduct stemming from his presence in the pro-Trump mob near the Capitol, brought his prosecution to a close. But it was unlikely to end the persistent narrative that he was a provocateur out to entrap his fellow conservatives on Jan. 6.
The FBI began looking into Epps, a former rancher and Marine from Arizona, almost immediately after Jan. 6 as investigators came into possession of video of him on the streets of Washington on Jan. 5 telling a group of Trump supporters to “go into the Capitol” the next day.
Several people in the crowd appeared to suspect him of being a government plant and hounded him with jeers of “Fed!”
Other videos from Jan. 6 itself showed Epps leaning toward a fellow rioter at a barricade outside the Capitol, seeming to whisper something in his ear. That man — a Pennsylvania barber named Ryan Samsel — confronted officers within minutes, leading to the first breach of police lines at the building.
Within two days of the Capitol being stormed, Epps saw his photo in an FBI alert and immediately contacted the bureau. The FBI in May 2021 declined to prosecute him.
But some media figures — including former Fox News host Tucker Carlson — began to suggest that Epps had been spared prosecution for a very different reason: because he was a covert government asset under the protection of his handlers.