Federal prosecutors revealed messages that a D.C. police officer exchanged with the leader of the Proud Boys before the January 6th insurrection during his trial.
On Wednesday (Feb.15th) in the trial of the far-right group’s leader, Henry “Enrique” Tarrio, and four associates, prosecutors for the federal government presented a series of text messages between him and Metropolitan Police Lt. Shane Lamond. These messages included internal information that Lamond shared with Tarrio. Lamond was an intelligence officer with the Metropolitan Police tasked with investigating the group, and a 23-year veteran of the force.
One exchange on December 18th, 2020 featured Lamond asking Tarrio if he had called in an anonymous tip claiming his responsibility in burning a Black Lives Matter banner taken from a historically Black church in downtown Washington D.C. after a Trump rally. Tarrio responded that he had done “more than that”, confirming he shared the deed on social media. On the same day, Tarrio had expressed to other Proud Boys members that he “got the jump on the narrative” on the burning in an effort to make it difficult to charge him with a hate crime. He cited his “contact at DC Metro”, advising those members to keep the info to themselves. Tarrio would also get word that he was to be arrested on January 4th, 2021, changing the settings in his chat with Lamond to have messages “self-destruct”.
Another startling exchange took place a week later as Lamond informed Tarrio that he had ID’d Tarrio to the criminal investigation department in a photo the leader had posted to Parler. “They may be submitting an arrest warrant to the U.S. Attorney’s office,” he wrote. Justice Department prosecutor Conor Mulroe asked FBI Special Agent Peter Dubrowski if he had ever observed law enforcement disclosing sensitive information in that manner, to which Dubrowski replied, “I’ve never heard of it. I see no benefit [to…
Read the full article here
