By Canadian Press

Proud Boys leader who burned BLM flag gets 5 months in jail

Aug 23, 2021 | 1:30 PM

The leader of the Proud Boys extremist group was sentenced to more than five months in jail on Monday for burning a Black Lives Matter banner that was torn down from a historic Black church in downtown Washington and bringing two high-capacity firearm magazines into the nation’s capital days shortly before the Jan. 6 riot.

Enrique Tarrio told the court he was “profusely” sorry for his actions, calling them a “grave mistake.”

“What I did was wrong,” Tarrio said during the hearing held via videoconference.

Tarrio was arrested as he arrived in Washington two days before thousands of supporters of then-President Donald Trump — including members of the Proud Boys — descended on the U.S. Capitol and disrupted the certification of the Electoral College vote. Tarrio was ordered to stay away from Washington, and law enforcement later said Tarrio was picked up in part to help quell potential violence.

Authorities say Proud Boys members stole the banner that read #BLACKLIVESMATTER from the Asbury United Methodist Church on Dec. 12 and then set it ablaze using lighter fluid and lighters. Tarrio posted a picture of himself holding an unlit lighter to his Parler account and admitted days later in an interview with The Washington Post that he joined in the burning of the banner.

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When police pulled Tarrio over on Jan. 4 on the warrant for vandalizing the sign, officers found two unloaded magazines emblazoned with the Proud Boys logo in his bag. Tarrio said, according to a police report, that he sells the clips and the ones he was carrying were purchased by a customer.

Tarrio pleaded guilty last month to destruction of property and attempted possession of a large-capacity ammunition feeding device.

Alanna Durkin Richer, The Associated Press