CBS News
Jan. 6 offenders have paid only a fraction of restitution owed for damage to U.S. Capitol during riot
Washington — Nearly 3 1/2 years after the U.S. Capitol siege, the government has recovered only a fraction of the court-ordered restitution payments for repairs, police injuries and cleanup of the damage caused by the rioters.
Hundreds of offenders who pleaded guilty or were convicted for their roles in the Capitol attack were ordered to pay for injuries to police officers who defended the Capitol and reimbursement to the architect of the Capitol to help offset the costs of repairs as a result of damage from Jan. 6, 2021.
Although the Justice Department and Capitol administrators have estimated the costs of cleanup and repairs were nearly $3,000,000, approximately 15% of the money has been paid back so far, according to a review by CBS News.
Kent Nishimura / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
A congressional source familiar with the matter told CBS News that approximately $437,000 has been reimbursed by Jan. 6 offenders to the architect of the Capitol.
Government document
Court-ordered restitution, often ranging from between $500 to $2,000 per Jan. 6 offender, has become a standard sentencing component — at least 884 have been sentenced so far.
But CBS News found that the payments have been sluggish, and federal taxpayers are far from being made whole because some offenders argue they are having difficulty coming up with the money. Another factor is that the court system and federal government have permitted a lenient timeframe for restitution payments.
“Those who were incited by the former president to violently attack the Capitol and stop the peaceful transfer of power owe the taxpayers money,” said Rep. Joe Morelle, a New York Democrat and ranking member of the House Administration Committee, which has oversight of the Capitol complex.
“The money they owe is to pay for repairs for damage that President Trump inspired them to inflict,” Morelle told CBS News,
In the 41 months since the attack, federal taxpayers have footed the bill for a range of repairs to the Capitol complex and for the costs of injuries and deployment of police officers who responded. Historic windows were smashed. Police equipment was stolen. Police officers suffered injuries and continue to require medical coverage. A CBS News review of Justice Department records shows nearly 150 police officers were assaulted on Jan. 6. A similar number reported suffering injuries.
Federal judges have exercised some flexibility and allowed a long time frame for offenders to make their restitution payments. In some cases, the courts have permitted them to make small monthly installment payments, and only after they are released from prison sentences. In cases reviewed by CBS News, offenders have been permitted to make payments as low as $250 a month. Some have yet to begin payments due to ongoing prison sentences.
Government document
A series of offenders have cited financial hardship. James Little, a 53-year-old truck driver from Claremont, North Carolina, pleaded guilty to unlawful picketing and parading. At his sentencing hearing in January 2024, he told the judge, “Because of the situation with Jan. 6 and the publicity about it, I have had a real hard time with my career the last three years.” He added, “So, it’s been a financial hardship for me for one thing. And I actually had to borrow the money from my mother.”
D.C. Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, a Democrat, demanded that offenders pay for the damage they caused.
“D.C. suffered significant damages due to the barbaric attack on January 6th, and it’s outrageous that only 16% of court-ordered restitution has been paid by the perpetrators more than three years later,” Norton said in a statement. “D.C., which bears the burdens of hosting the federal government and pays the highest per capita federal taxes in the country, must be made whole.”
Further complicating matters for the architect of the Capitol, the agency has faced obstacles in getting access to the money paid so far. A congressional aide familiar with the issue told CBS News the $437,000 in payments collected so far has been transferred to an account in the Treasury Department, as required under current law. House members will consider adding language and provisions to an upcoming government funding bill to enable the architect of the Capitol to more easily access and deposit the Jan. 6 restitution funds.
The Justice Department regularly cites the widespread damage and impact of the attack when asking for the court to order restitution at Jan. 6 sentencing hearings. Higher-level offenders, including those who were convicted of conspiracy, have been ordered to pay $2,000 each. Lower-level offenders, including those who did not engage in violence or theft, have been required to pay $500.
In a February 2022 court filing in the case of Robert Schornak, the Justice Department said reimbursements were needed from offenders to offset the “cost of damages to the Capitol Building and Grounds, the costs associated with the deployment of additional law enforcement units to the Capitol, the cost of broken or damaged law-enforcement equipment, the cost of stolen property and costs associated with bodily injuries sustained by law enforcement officers and other victims.”
The costs suffered for helping injured officers has been cited at some Jan. 6 criminal proceedings. At the March 21 sentencing of Jeffrey Sabol, the judge said the cost of leave and treatment for one Washington, D.C., Metropolitan Police officer has exceeded $30,000 so far.
Sabol’s defense attorney cited likely challenges in Sabol’s ability to promptly pay the restitution in his case. At Sabol’s March 21 sentencing hearing, Judge Rudolph Contreras said, “The defendant has been detained for almost 3 years and, thus, has not been able to earn a living. He otherwise lacks assets and will have to pay restitution.”
Former President Trump has publicly pledged to pardon Jan. 6 defendants but hasn’t specified whether he would also seek to commute their restitution payments. The Justice Department has considered the completion of restitution payments as part of its criteria when deciding whether to support a defendant’s pardon application.
A person familiar with the process said that usually, defendants discuss with their probation officers the timing and amount they’re able to pay. This generally occurs during the supervised release period and the timetable for payment is set by what probation officers deem feasible.
But the Justice Department’s website says “the chance of full recovery is very low” because “[m]any defendants will not have sufficient assets to repay their victims.”
CBS News
Dozens of Britons were “killed and butchered” and then cannibalized after Bronze Age massacre, research shows
New research suggests that dozens of Bronze-Age era Britons were killed in an attack unlike any previous known to archaelogists studying that time period and location.
The research on human remains from Charterhouse Warren in southwest England, conducted by a team of researchers from multiple institutions including Oxford University, was published in Antiquity, a journal of world archaeology. It found that at least 37 Bronze Age-era men, women and children were “killed and butchered” and then cannibalized, with their bodies then thrown down a nearly 50-foot deep natural shaft. While archaeologists have found the remains of Bronze Age and later Britons who died violently, those incidents were largely isolated. Mass graves from this era have also been found, but the remains were laid to rest respectfully, unlike those studied.
Researchers first became aware of the shaft in the 1970s. Two excavations were conducted in the 1970s and 1980s. The human remains, as well as some artifacts including a flint dagger, were found at multiple spots in the shaft during these digs. More than 3,000 individual human bones and bone fragments have been recovered overall. Those bones were used to estimate that at least 37 individual sets of remains were in the shaft. Different bone lengths show that the people killed were both male and female, and ranged in age from infants to grown adults. Ongoing research is working to determine how the people were related to each other.
The way the remains were disposed of made the detailed examination possible, the researchers said. The shaft helped preserve the bones and keep them grouped together.
Cambridge University Press on behalf of Antiquity Publications Ltd
The bones “display clear evidence of blunt force trauma,” according to researchers, suggesting that many of the people in the shaft “suffered a violent death.” Other injuries, including removal of the scalp and severed muscles in the jaw suggesting removal of the tongue or lower jaw, also likely occurred, evidenced by marks on the bones, the researchers said. Some of the victims may have been beheaded or dismembered.
It’s possible that the victims were held captive or ambushed, because of the severity of the injuries, the researchers said. It’s not clear who could have carried out the attacks.
There is also evidence that the bodies were cannibalized, the researchers said, including human teethmarks on the bones and indicators that marrow, the soft tissue inside bones, was removed. The researchers said the cannibalism was likely conducted “within a context of a violent conflict, in which individuals are dehumanized and treated as animals.”
“Some 37 men, women and children—and possibly many more—were killed at close quarters with blunt instruments and then systematically dismembered and defleshed, their long bones fractured in a way that can only be described as butchery,” the researchers said.
Later in the publication, the researchers referred to the scene as a “massacre,” and suggested it may have even been a “political statement” of violence so brazen it would have “resonated across the wider region and over time.” However, it’s not clear what could have led to the violence: “Neither climate change, ethnic conflict nor competition over material resources seem to offer convincing explanations,” according to the researchers, leaving the only likely option that the violence broke out as part of a pattern of revenge or violence between communities.
“At this stage, our investigation has raised as many questions as it has answered,” the researchers said. “Work is ongoing to shed more light on this decidedly dark episode in British prehistory.”
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