Left: Ray Epps is seen talking with accused Jan. 6 rioter and Proud Boys member Ryan Samsel near the Peace Circle monument (via FBI court filing). Right: Epps is seen talking to another person in the crowd outside the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 (via police body camera footage/YouTube CBS News screengrab).
Federal prosecutors want the Arizona man at the center of a disproven right-wing conspiracy theory about the forces behind the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol — and who himself allegedly continues to amplify baseless rumors about suspected rioters — to spend months behind bars.
The government notes that James Ray Epps Sr., 62, is in several ways a victim and a target of the fervor of supporters of former president Donald Trump, but participated in the destruction that day when thousands of them descended on the Capitol as Congress was set to certify Joe Biden’s 2020 electoral win. Prosecutors say he should spend six months in jail — the statutory maximum for the disorderly conduct misdemeanor to which he pleaded guilty — followed by one year of supervised release.
Epps has agreed to pay $500 in restitution toward the nearly $3 million in damage caused to the Capitol, the government says.
Epps was seen in Washington on Jan. 5 and Jan. 6 participating in various pro-Trump activities, including attending the so-called “Stop the Steal” rally that proceeded the march on the Capitol building. At one point, he was seen talking with accused Proud Boy member Ryan Samsel, who was part of the charge at the area known as the Peace Circle that resulted in at least one police officer suffering a head injury.
The fact that he wasn’t arrested shortly after the riot — and that he was removed from the FBI’s Most Wanted list after reaching out to federal investigators himself — gave rise to the theory that Epps was a federal plant, sent to rile up the pro-Trump crowd and lead them into a “false flag” operation.
He pleaded guilty in September to a single count of disorderly or disruptive conduct in a restricted building or grounds.
Prosecutors said Epps, who is scheduled to be sentenced on Jan. 9, is singular among the thousands of alleged rioters at the Capitol that day.
“This is a unique case in the context of January 6 defendants,” says the government’s sentencing memo, filed Tuesday. “Although Epps engaged in felonious conduct during the riot on January 6, his case includes a variety of distinctive and compelling mitigating factors, which led the government to exercise its prosecutorial discretion and offer Epps a pre-indictment misdemeanor plea resolution.”
Prosecutors note that Epps turned himself in to the FBI within days of the destructive riot, cooperated with investigators and Congress, and “engaged in at least five efforts on January 6 to deescalate conflict and avoid violence between rioters and police officers.”
While remorseful, however, Epps “continues to speciously blame members of Antifa secretly posing as Trump supporters for the violence and property damage that occurred at the Capitol on January 6,” the memo says. Prosecutors also note that Epps has been “the target of a false and widespread conspiracy theory that he was an undercover government agent on January 6.”
Indeed, Epps has sued former Fox News host Tucker Carlson, who was among the loudest voices amplifying the Epps “false flag” conspiracy theory, after asking for an apology.
However, prosecutors indicate that Epps still, at times, fails to see what happened that day.
“Ironically, given the conspiracy theory surrounding him, Epps repeatedly attributed the violence that occurred on January 6 to undercover members of Antifa posing as Trump supporters and inciting others to hijack a righteous peaceful protest,” the sentencing memo says.
In his filing memo, meanwhile, Epps is requesting a sentence of probation only.
“From the outset, Mr. Epps has been remorseful and cooperative, attempting to mitigate the harm that occurred to the Nation on January 6th,” the defendant’s sentencing memo says. “For his actions, one would think he might be lauded. Instead, he has been attacked, defamed, and vilified — and after a decision that his actions at the Capitol did not warrant prosecution, a 180-degree turnaround by the government, with the threat of a request for prison time, after his name became dragged through the mud by right-wing political dramaturges who used the (correct) lack of prosecution as a social media and public cudgel against the Garland Justice Department.”
Epps’ case is before U.S. District Judge James Boasberg, a Barack Obama appointee.
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