Capitol rioter who sprayed Agent Brian Sicknick with bear spray has been sentenced to 80 months in prison

Capitol rioter Julian Khater has been sentenced to 80 months in prison for his role in the pepper spray attack of police officer Brian Sicknick, who died the day after the January 6, 2021 riot.

The sentence is slightly short of the 90 months prosecutors demanded for Khater, 32, who used pepper spray against Sicknick and two other police officers and pleaded guilty to two counts of assaulting police last year. Khater will also have to pay a $10,000 fine.

“I’ve taken every possible change to improve myself as a person,” Khater said. “What happened on January 6 – there are no words for it… I wish I could take it back.”

Sicknick died of a stroke the next day. Although the medical examiner, Francisco J. Diaz, later attributed his death to natural causes, he told the Washington Post that he believed “everything that happened on January 6, 2021” played a role in his death.

Thousands of Donald Trump supporters stormed the Capitol that day in an attempt to undo his election loss.

George Tanios, 41, of Morgantown, West Virginia, has been sentenced to prison after pleading guilty last year to minor charges of disorderly conduct on limited grounds. Prosecutors had asked the judge to give him credit for the time he spent in pre-trial detention.

His lawyers have told the judge that their client “deeply regrets” his actions.

Capitol rioter Julian Khater (pictured left) has been sentenced to 80 months in prison for his role in the pepper spray attack on police officer Brian Sicknick (pictured right), who died the day after the January 6, 2021 riot

George Tanios (pictured), 41, of Morgantown, West Virginia, has been sentenced to prison after pleading guilty last year to minor charges of disorderly conduct on limited grounds. Prosecutors had asked the judge to give him credit for the time he spent in pre-trial detention

Ahead of Friday’s sentencing, Sicknick’s relatives sent letters to U.S. District Judge Thomas Hogan asking him to hand down the harshest possible sentences.

“I don’t know what kind of upbringing you had…what happened in your childhood that contributed to your delusional sense of right and wrong,” Sicknick’s mother, Gladys Sicknick, wrote, addressing her son’s attacker.

“If I were your mother I would be ashamed to have a son like you. I couldn’t bear to look at you – never again. That’s how I feel now. Let this be the last time, Mr. Khater.’

In his letter, Brian Sicknick’s brother, Kenneth Sicknick, declined to name either defendant.

‘People have names. Dogs have names. Pet rocks get names. The two defendants are not worthy of having names or being addressed as such,” he wrote.

Khater and Tanios are two of more than 950 people charged in connection with the attack on the Capitol. Four participants died during the chaos and five police officers, including Sicknick, died afterwards, some by suicide.

Prosecutors have said Tanios drove from his home in West Virginia to pick up Khater in New Jersey before continuing to Washington prior to the riot.

The sentence is slightly short of the 90 months prosecutors demanded for Khater, 32, who used pepper spray against Sicknick and two other police officers and pleaded guilty to two counts of assaulting police last year. Khater will also have to pay a $10,000 fine

Brianne Chapman protests during the sentencing hearing of Julian Khater and George Tanios

After attending a rally, they joined the crowd on their way to the Capitol, though there is no evidence they intended to enter the building or block the certification of electoral votes.

They arrived with two canisters of bear spray, which they did not use, and two canisters of pepper spray, one of which Khater did use.

In a video, Khater can be heard saying “Give me that bear shit” before reaching into Tanios’ backpack.

“The tragic death of Office Sicknick, so close to the traumatic events of that day, underscores the gravity of the crime committed by Khater,” the prosecutors wrote in their memo to the judge.

Khater’s lawyer is also asking the judge to impose a prison sentence, noting that his client has been detained since his arrest in March 2021, subjected to “inhumane conditions” and already suffering from anguish dating back to the escape of his family from Lebanon during the war between Israel and Hezbollah.

Gladys Sicknick, the mother of fallen Capitol police officer Brian Sicknick, arrives for the sentencing hearing of Julian Khater and George Tanios

“Whether it was just the heat of the moment or the addition of trauma still lingering from fleeing Lebanon as it was being bombed, something in Julian was activated,” his attorney Chad Seigel wrote in his sentencing memo to the judge.