The New Jersey man who sprayed bear spray into the face of Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick, likely a factor in the series of strokes that took the officer’s life the next day, received an 80-month prison sentence, WUSA-9 in Washington reports.
Thirty-three-year-old Julian Khater pleaded guilty to two counts of assaulting police with a dangerous weapon as part of a plea deal. “This defendant committed cowardly and premeditated assault on at least three uniformed officers,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Gilead Light told U.S. District in Washington, DC Senior Judge Thomas Hogan, adding, “The line fell five minutes after Julian Khater’s pepper spray. The line fell and we know what happened next.”
Hogan called out Khater for a weak pseudo-apology: “Your thoughtful statement right now did not really include any apology to the officers you sprayed. I didn’t hear any expression or sorry about the employees of the Capitol, many who hid for their lives and resigned and never came back to work.”