Capitol Police officer charged with obstructing justice

WASHINGTON >> A U.S. Capitol Police officer was arrested Friday on charges that he obstructed justice by telling a man who had entered the Capitol illegally during the Jan. 6 riot to delete evidence of his actions that day from his social media accounts.

Michael A. Riley, 50, a member of the agency’s K-9 unit with more than 25 years on the force, is the first officer charged with a crime in connection with the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, when scores of his fellow officers were beaten, bloodied and injured by a pro-Trump mob spurred on by the lie of widespread election fraud.

He was released pending an Oct. 26 hearing.

According to an indictment from a federal grand jury in Washington, on Jan. 7, Riley contacted an acquaintance who had posted images on Facebook of himself inside the Capitol during the attack to encourage him to take down the evidence that he had been in the building. Riley did not know the man personally, the indictment said, but had recently become acquainted with him through an online group for fishing enthusiasts.

“I’m a Capitol Police officer who agrees with your political stance,” the officer wrote to the man, according to the indictment. “Take down the part about being in the building. They are currently investigating and everyone who was in the building is going to be charged. Just looking out!”

Riley and the man then exchanged dozens of messages.

On Jan. 20, the unidentified man turned himself in to police and told them he had been talking with Riley, then warned the officer that federal law enforcement officials were aware they had been communicating.

“The FBI was very curious that I had been speaking to you. If they haven’t already asked you about me they are gonna,” the man wrote to Riley, according to the indictment. “They took my phone and downloaded everything.”

After receiving that message, Riley deleted all his Facebook messages with the man, and the next day, sent him a final Facebook message, according to the indictment.

“Another mutual friend was talking about you last night. I tried to defend you but then he showed me a video of you in the Capitol smoking weed and acting like a moron,” he wrote. “I have to say, I was shocked and dumbfounded, since your story of getting pushed in the building with no other choice now seems not only false but is a complete lie. I feel like a moron for believing you.”