L.I. lawyer in Capitol riot bust
Internet & kin help police track him in cop bashing
A 9/11 truther lawyer from Long Island is accused of trying to take a Washington D.C. cop’s baton and shoving a bike rack into several police officers during a pitched battle outside the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
John O’Kelly, 66, is the latest to face federal charges for his role in the insurrection. Federal authorities arrested him on Thursday, after online sleuths and a family friend helped identify him as the man in an FBI “be on the lookout” photo.
O’Kelly was caught on video grabbing the baton of a D.C. Metropolitan Police Department officer and trying it to wrestle it away from him, according to a federal court filing unsealed Thursday.
“(Body-cam) footage shows that the MPD officer fought intensely and successfully to keep his baton in his possession,” the filing alleges. Footage also shows him taking a metal bike rack and pushing it at the officers trying to secure the Capitol perimeter, prosecutors allege.
O’Kelly, who lives in East Williston, Nassau County, is listed as a member of the “Lawyers Committee For 9/11 Inquiry” on the group’s web site.
His profile on the site describes him as co-counsel on a lawsuit trying to force federal prosecutors to bring “evidence regarding the use of explosives to destroy three World Trade Center buildings on 9/11 to a special grand jury.” The suit was filed in Manhattan Federal Court last year, public records show.
After the FBI released his photo, the Twitter account @
SeditionHunters posted more pictures using the hashtag #MidWhiteCrisis in April 2021.
In July 2021, the FBI got a tip from someone using open source photo ID software that identified O’Kelly as a likely match, according to the federal filing.
The FBI got O’Kelly’s DMV photo, and used facial recognition software to link him to more photos taken at the Capitol, the feds said. Agents also spoke to a “longtime friend of the O’Kelly family who knows John O’Kelly personally,” who IDed him from the pictures, and helped the investigators find his cell phone number, the filing alleges.
That phone number made a call to another suspected rioter’s cell number, and investigators found out that O’Kelly had a reservation at the Residence
Inn Arlington Ballston hotel in Arlington, Va., the night before the riot.
He faces felony charges of assaulting, resisting, or impeding law enforcement officers and interfering with law enforcement officers during a civil disorder, as well as related misdemeanor offenses. His case is being prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia.
So far, more than 880 people have been arrested in connection with the siege on the Capitol.
Magistrate Judge Steven Tiscione ordered O’Kelly released on $100,000 bond after a virtual arraignment in Central Islip, Long Island.
He and his Federal Defenders lawyer did not return messages seeking comment Thursday.