70°
Vincent Gillespie was convicted earlier this month of assaulting, resisting, or impeding officers; civil disorder; engaging in physical violence in a restricted building or grounds; and acts of physical violence in the Capitol grounds or buildings, the US Attorney's Office said. A judge will sentence him in March.
NBC News reporter Ryan J. Reilly tweeted that in November Gillespie turned down a plea offer that would have sentenced him to 41 to 51 months in federal prison. He likely faces a longer sentence following his conviction.
Gillespie is the son of the late artist Gregory Gillespie whose paintings hang in the Smithsonian, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, and many others. He died in 2000.
Federal investigators said Vincent Gillespie was part of a mob that attacked a phalanx of police guarding the entrance to the Lower West Terrace tunnel, where the fighting was some of the fiercest that day. Police said Gillespie fought his way to the front to the press and stole an officer's riot shield, and rammed it into one of the sentries.
He even pulled one of the officers into the mob of people. Federal investigators said they could hear on the police's body camera Gillespie screaming "traitor" and "treason."
Gillespie testified during his trial and told the court that he had "fun" during the attempted insurrection, the jury forewoman said, per NBC Boston.
"He testified about finding the events of Jan. 6 fun and enjoyable," Niki Christoff said.
Jurors deliberated a little more than a day following the three-day trial, reports said.
Gillespie appears to have never wavered about participating in the violent riots that day. He gave his full name and where he lived to an AP reporter who interviewed him on Jan. 6.
In the video, Gillespie tries to get the pepper spray out of his eyes that police had used to push back the mob as he speaks, and he has a bloody cut on his head he supposedly got during the war for the Lower West Terrace door.
"We were almost overpowering them," Gillespie told the AP journalist after the fight. "If you had like another 15, 20 guys behind us pushing, I think we could have won it."
Many tipsters, including a neighbor and several Athol government employees, identified Gillespie to federal investigators in videos and photos from the attack.
Click here to follow Daily Voice Springfield and receive free news updates.
