crime
WASHINGTON (AP) — A Massachusetts doctor who punched a police officer during a mob attack on the U.S. Capitol was sentenced Thursday to nine months in prison, followed by nine months of house arrest.
Jacquelyn Starer was in a crowd of rioters on the Capitol on January 6, 2021, when she punched the police officer and shouted a vulgar slur.
Starer told U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly that she was not pleased with her actions that day, including her “regrettable encounter” with the officer.
“I take full responsibility for my actions that day and truly wish reason had prevailed over my emotions,” she said.
Starer also reached out to the police officer she attacked to apologize. The officer, identified in court documents only by her initials, told the judge she feared for her life as she and other law enforcement officials fought for hours to defend the Capitol from the mob of Donald Trump supporters.
“Do you really take responsibility for your actions or are you just going to say, 'It wasn't my fault. Fight or flight?'” the officer asked Starer before she addressed the court.
Starer, 70, of Ashland, Massachusetts, pleaded guilty in April to eight charges, including aggravated assault, without reaching an agreement with prosecutors.
Prosecutors really helpful a jail sentence of two years and three months for Starer, a physician who practiced primarily as an addiction medicine specialist before her arrest. Starer's lawyers asked the judge to sentence her to deal with arrest as an alternative of prison.
Online licensing records show that Starer agreed in January 2023 to now not practice medicine in Massachusetts. The state had issued her a medical license in 1983.
Starer attended then-President Trump's “Stop the Steal” rally near the White House on Jan. 6 before joining the mob outside the Capitol, entering the constructing through the Rotunda doors about quarter-hour after they were breached.
In the Rotunda, Starer joined other rioters and attempted to get past law enforcement officials guarding a doorway to then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's office. Starer pushed through other rioters and got to the front of the police line, where she yelled at officers.
When one other rioter tried to restrain her, Starer grabbed his arm, pushed him down, after which shoved him into the police line. When considered one of those officers pushed Starer backwards, she turned around and punched the officer. The attack was captured on video by a police body camera.
“The rioters responded to the attack by becoming more aggressive and then storming the police line,” a Justice Department prosecutor wrote.
Starer's lawyers said she became indignant on the rioter who tried to restrain her. She instinctively punched the officer's arm in response to the shove, her lawyers said. They argued Starer was reacting to the shove and was not motivated by the officer's skilled status.
“Dr. Starer deeply regrets this entire interaction and is fully aware that it constituted criminal conduct on her part,” her lawyers wrote.
The judge said Starer raced toward the police cordon “like a heat-seeking missile.”
“Given the threat to the physical safety of our members of Congress, this is a pretty disturbing thing,” Kelly said.
The judge asked Starer where she desired to go.
“The short answer is, 'I don't know,'” she replied.
Starer seemed to be fighting the results of the pepper spray as she left the Capitol about quarter-hour after entering the constructing.
“She received assistance from other rioters, including a rioter in camouflage clothing wearing a helmet with a military patch reading 'MILIZIA,'” the prosecutor wrote.
Starer's lawyers said she realized she had probably treated her last patient.
“Her inability to do the work she loves so much has left a very large void in her life that she will find difficult to fill,” they wrote.
Nearly 1,500 people have been charged with federal crimes related to the Capitol riots. More than 900 of them have been convicted and sentenced to prison terms, with about two-thirds receiving sentences starting from a number of days to 22 years.
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