Left: Isaac Thomas is seen inside the U.S. Capitol building on Jan. 6, 2021. Right: Thomas is allegedly pictured striking a police officer with a flagpole outside the Capitol on Jan. 6. Images via FBI court filings.
A Michigan couple who drove to Washington, D.C., from New York were forced to take a bus back home after losing track of their car while allegedly participating in the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Isaac Thomas, 20, and Christina Legros, 22, were arrested in Michigan on multiple charges related to the incident, the Justice Department announced Tuesday. Legros was arrested Monday, the DOJ said; Thomas was arrested on Jan. 26.
According to prosecutors, Thomas and Legros drove from Michigan to New York on Dec. 27, 2020, to celebrate the new year, traveling in a grey Chevrolet Equinox that belonged to Legros’ grandmother. On Jan. 5, 2021, they drove to Washington and stayed at a hotel in Alexandria, Virginia, parking the car “on an unknown side street nearby.”
The couple was allegedly among the first group of rioters present at the initial breach of the police line near the Peace Circle, which the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack identified as the location that members of the Proud Boys extremist group had allegedly targeted as a security soft spot.
They then walked to the west side of the building where a Capitol Police line had formed, carrying “a blue flag with a pole,” according to the DOJ. Thomas is seen on video footage from Legros’ phone yelling at police officers at around 1:40 p.m.
“Don’t do nothing dumb like that, because I will whack you upside your head with this pole!” Thomas allegedly said.
According to prosecutors, Thomas followed through on his threat.
“This video then depicts an officer with the Metropolitan Police Department deploying a spray on the crowd before Thomas can again be heard yelling: ‘Get him, guys get him!'” the statement of facts says. “During the chaotic recording, the video depicts Thomas doing precisely what he said he would to these officers with his flagpole. Thomas moved through the crowd and swung his flagpole at an officer’s head.”
Separate video of the same incident allegedly shows a U.S. Capitol Police officer grabbing the flagpole and throwing it aside.
Surveillance footage captured Legros entering the Capitol at 2:17 p.m. through the Senate Wing door, minutes after the initial breach of the building. Thomas apparently enters through the same door moments later, and they make their way together to the Capitol Crypt.
Like countless other accused Jan. 6 rioters who breached the building as Congress had begun to certify Joe Biden‘s 2020 electoral victory over Donald Trump, Thomas recorded himself as he made his way through the Capitol that day.
“We managed to break our way in, pushed passed all these phony soldiers, some worked with us, some sprayed us or shot us with rubber bullets,” he said, according to federal documents. “But let me tell ya, we got through. And we are demanding an answer. For the United States of America. For the flag.”
Thomas was also among the accused rioters who targeted the office suite of then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), whose staffers either fled the building or sheltered in place for hours.
“Knocking on Nancy Pelosi’s door!” he reportedly said. “Millions of us broke in, err, made our way into the Capitol rightfully. Umm and we are angry . . . Four million people are going to knock on this door.”
He later recorded himself allegedly sitting at a conference table in Pelosi’s suite.
“Sup ya’ll,” he said, according to prosecutors. “So we are sitting in the Speaker of the House’s Office because umm the United States of America thinks we were playing. When we came up with four million at the doorstep and came into Nancy Pelosi’s [cut] and we said ‘F–k This we ain’t [cut] . . . Do not let them take our country. [Vice President] Mike Pence failed us today. Ya’ll better take your country back. Take your freedom back for the sake of your families and your children!”
Thomas and Legros then found each other in the Rotunda, where they faced off against police who had used chemical spray to try to disperse the crowd.
“Ya’ll are all going to pay for that,” Thomas is heard saying on police body-worn camera footage. “You’ll see. Love ya. Hope you have a good day!”
Thomas and Legros are then seen leaving the building separately. Legros told federal investigators that her phone died while she and Thomas were separated. They eventually reunited, but the same could not be said of Legros’ grandmother’s Chevy Equinox.
“She attempted to return to where the vehicle was parked only to discover that it was no longer present,” the probable cause affidavit says. “Neither her nor Thomas could find the vehicle, and ultimately the two returned to Michigan on January 10, 2021 on a Greyhound bus.”
Legros has been charged with misdemeanors for trespassing and disorderly conduct that total a potential three years behind bars. Thomas is facing significantly more severe charges, including obstruction of an official proceeding of Congress and assaulting, resisting, or impeding an officer using a dangerous weapon, both of which carry a potential sentence of 20 years in prison.
