A Michigan man described by prosecutors as a self-professed militia leader was sentenced on Friday to more than four years in prison for attacking law enforcement officers with a stolen police baton during the Jan. 6, 2021 breach of the U.S. Capitol.
Matthew Thomas Krol, of Linden, Michigan, used a baton he took from police to assault at least three officers, injuring one of them. His attacks were captured on camera. A prosecutor characterized Mr. Krol as one of the worst instigators of violence during the event.
Mr. Krol pleaded guilty to an assault charge in August.
During the event, Mr. Krol swung the stolen police baton at Capitol Police Sgt. Aquilino Gonell, hitting his outstretched right hand, leaving it bloody and swollen.
Before the judge announced his ruling, Mr. Krol apologized to Mr. Gonell, who was in attendance.
“I don’t expect you to accept my apology, but I hope one day you do,” he told the former officer, who left the department a year ago.
Mr. Gonell urged the judge to hold his assailant “accountable” for his actions on Jan. 6.
“The course of my life was changed that day, and he was part of the mob that ensured I’d lose my career,” Mr. Gonell said.
U.S. District Judge Rudolph Contreras sentenced the 65-year-old to four years and three months. The sentence includes his time spent in jail since his arrest in February 2022. Prosecutors had requested a prison term of six years and six months.
Mr. Krol, who described himself a “militia enthusiast,” is the self-proclaimed executive officer of the Genesee County Volunteer Militia in Michigan, prosecutors said.
During the investigation, it was found that Mr. Krol was also associated with three members of the Wolverine Watchmen paramilitary group who were convicted last year for their involvement in a 2020 plot to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer.
Though Mr. Krol isn’t accused of any involvement in the plot, federal investigators found he exchanged private messages with the group’s leaders in Michigan. One of them was Adam Fox, who was sentenced to 16 years in prison after a federal jury convicted him and another man of conspiring to kidnap Ms. Whitmer.
“I spoke on the Michigan Capitol steps last fall that I would rather apprehend Tyrants at the Capital, hang them on those beautiful oak tress (than) kill citizens in a civil war,” Mr. Kroll told Mr. Fox during one of their chats. Another time, he said he was “willing to kill or die for Liberty.”
Defense attorney Michael Cronkright excused his client’s words as merely “hyperbolic and inflammatory statements that he now regrets,” emphasizing that he wasn’t closely associated with the Wolverine Watchmen and knew nothing about a kidnapping plot.
“The government uses the phrase that Mr. Krol was ‘an associate of members’ to allude to a greater connection than exists,” Mr. Cronkright wrote.
Prosecutors argued that the defendant had “expressed his willingness to engage in mob violence to achieve his political objectives” before he joined the January 6 protest at the Capitol.
“In Facebook messages, Krol evoked the use of violence against politicians and open hostility toward (Whitmer), in addition to sharing pictures of himself carrying weaponry,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew Tessman wrote in a court filing.
In his closing plea, Mr. Cronkright reminded the court that his client dedicated decades of his life to missionary and disaster relief work in various parts of the world, including Haiti, India, Thailand, Guatemala, and elsewhere, while his attacks on police at the Capitol lasted less than a minute.
“That minute, or even that hour, doesn’t define Matthew Krol even if it demonstrates his worst behavior on January 6, 2021. Mr. Krol will offer no excuse for that behavior,” Mr. Cronkright wrote.
More than 1,200 people have now been charged with federal crimes related to Jan. 6, as recently released video footage raises additional questions about the official narrative of the event.
Approximately 900 accused have pleaded guilty or been convicted by a judge or jury after trials. Over 700 have been sentenced, with roughly two-thirds of them receiving terms of imprisonment ranging from three days to 22 years.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
