Proud Boys leader was ‘prolific’ informant
Denies working undercover for authorities
WASHINGTON • Enrique Tarrio, the leader of the Proud Boys extremist group, has a past as an informer for federal and local law enforcement, repeatedly working undercover for investigators after he was arrested in 2012, according to a former prosecutor and a transcript of a 2014 federal court proceeding obtained by reuters.
In the Miami hearing, a federal prosecutor, a Federal Bureau of Investigation agent and Tarrio’s own lawyer described his undercover work and said he had helped authorities prosecute more than a dozen people in various cases involving drugs, gambling and human smuggling.
Tarrio, in an interview Tuesday, denied working undercover or co-operating in cases.
“I don’t know any of this,” he said, when asked about the transcript. “I don’t recall any of this.”
Law-enforcement officials and the court transcript contradict Tarrio’s denial. In a statement, former federal prosecutor Vanessa Singh Johannes confirmed that “he cooperated with local and federal law enforcement, to aid in the prosecution of those running other, separate criminal enterprises, ranging from running marijuana grow houses in Miami to operating pharmaceutical fraud schemes.”
There is no evidence Tarrio has cooperated with authorities since then.
Tarrio, 36, organizes and leads the right-wing Proud Boys in their confrontations with those they believe to be Antifa, an amorphous and often violent leftist movement. The Proud Boys were involved in the insurrection at the Capitol Jan. 6.
Washington police arrested Tarrio when he arrived in the city two days before the Capitol hill riot.
he was charged with possessing two high-capacity rifle magazines, and burning a Black Lives Matter banner during a december demonstration by Trump supporters. The court ordered him to leave the city pending a court date in June.
Though Tarrio did not take part in the insurrection, at least five Proud Boys members have been charged in the riot
during the hearing in 2014, the prosecutor and Tarrio’s attorney asked a judge to reduce the sentence of Tarrio and two co-defendants. They had pleaded guilty in a fraud case related to the relabelling and sale of stolen diabetes test kits..