Retired Chicago Firefighter To Be Sentenced Over Role At Capitol Riot

WASHINGTON — Federal prosecutors want a retired Chicago firefighter to spend more than a year in prison for his involvement in the Jan. 6 Capitol riot.

Joseph Pavlik, 66, of Chicago, is due to learn his sentence on Friday after he pleaded guilty in August to two felony counts — one count of civil disorder and one count of entering or remaining in a restricted building or grounds with a deadly or dangerous weapon.

Pavlik, a 33-year Chicago Fire Department veteran, was charged in February in a five-count indictment along with others members of a Florida-based militia group, but prosecutors agreed to drop three of them in exchange for his guilty plea.

According to court documents, the "B Squad" is a subgroup of the "Guardians of Freedom." The group has a similar ideology to the "Three Percenters," the logo of which was visible on Pavlik's jacket during the riot.

An FBI agent said he believes that by identifying as "B Squad" and talking about a "plan B," members of the group were "referring to an alternate plan to be in place if they do not get the desired electoral outcome (i.e., the former president remaining in power)."

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Pavlik is the uncle of Jeremy Liggett, a leader of the Guardians of Freedom and a one-time Republican congressional candidate in Florida who sometimes identified by federal investigators as "B Leader."

According to Pavlik's attorney, Lawrence Beaumont, Liggett lied to him about having a contract with the U.S. Marshals Service to provide security at Donald Trump's rally on the morning of the riot.

In a sentencing memo asking the judge to spare Pavlik from federal prison and sentence him to five years probation instead, Beaumont said Pavlik went back to his hotel after Trump's rally and took a nap.

He later changed his mind and decided to head to the capitol dressed in a helmet, gas mask and a protective vest with pepper spray in the pocket, his attorney said.

At one point during the violent confrontation between police and protestors, Pavlik gave an extra pair of protective goggles to a police officer who did not have eye protection before he continued to try to force his way into the tunnel leading into the Capitol building.

Officers in the tunnel were kept under siege for nearly two and a half hours by rioters, according to prosecutors.

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"After Pavlik pushed against officers in the Tunnel for about 10 minutes, police successfully expelled him," Assistant U.S. Attorney Joshua Ontell said in the government's sentencing memo.

"Nevertheless, he stayed at the Tunnel entrance and took out a canister of chemical spray that he had brought with him. Pavlik put his hand on the nozzle, but the crowd jostled him, and he fumbled the can before he could use it against officers," Ontell alleged.

"Undeterred, as he walked away from the Tunnel entrance, he passed a can of chemical spray back to the mouth of the Tunnel, where another rioter grabbed the can and used it on the officers there."

Ontell also pointed to Pavlik's "unrepentant and violent" social media and text message history, but the prosecutor said his gift of goggles to a police officer justified a reduction in his sentence from the high end of federal sentencing guidelines down to 13 months in prison and 3 years supervised release.

Both Pavlik's attorney and the prosecution agree that he should pay $2,000 as restitution.

In arguing for probation, Beaumont emphasized that his client only spent about 20 minutes in the tunnel did not brandish the pepper spray, did not enter the Capitol building itself, did not personally damage any property and did not hurt anybody.

"The defendant would further note that he did not participate in the planning of any attack, recruit others to participate in the offense, and was invited to Washington D.C. by his nephew," Beaumont said.

Pavlik, a native of Chicago's Southwest Side, retired from the Chicago Fire Department as a lieutenant in 2013. Since then, he has taught firearm safety classes and first-aid classes. His involvement in the riot was a "less-than-one-hour departure from a lifetime of otherwise law abiding, respectful, and helpful citizenship," according to his attorney.

More than 1,200 people in every state have been charged with crimes related to the Capitol breach. According to the Justice Department, more than 400 of them have been charged with felony assaulting or impeding law enforcement.