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NJ man who attended Capitol riot arrested by the FBI

Suzanne Russell

A New Jersey man, who was part of the crowd trying to push their way into the House of Representatives when a woman was fatally shot by police, has been charged by the FBI with entering the Capitol during last week's riot and attempting to disrupt Congress.

Thomas Baranyi, 29, of Ewing, was charged after the FBI reviewed a WUSA-9 video in which he is wearing a blue New York Giants sweatshirt, blue backpack, blue baseball hat with the words "Rebuild America Trump Pence 2016.” He identifies himself by name and says he is from New Jersey, according to the complaint filed in the federal District Court for the District of Columbia.

Baranyi, charged by an FBI special agent in the Newark field office who specializes in international and domestic terrorism, faces federal charges of entering and remaining in a restricted building without authority and engaging in disorderly conduct on the grounds of the Capitol building to disturb a session of Congress.

Court documents state Baranyi showed the reporter blood on his hand and explained after storming into a hallway outside the House of Representatives chambers, there was a woman who broke through the door windows and as police and Secret Service were telling people to get out of the way, the woman "didn't heed the call" and she was shot in the neck and she fell back on him.

That woman was later identified as Ashli Babbitt, who was reportedly shot by a U.S. Capitol Police Officer at an entryway to the Speaker’s Lobby in the U.S. Capitol, the complaint states.

Baranyi told the reporter he and others "blitzed our way in through all the chambers just trying to get into Congress or whoever we could get in to and tell them that we need some kind of investigation into this.”

Baranyi described leaving the building after “riot police came in and started ushering us out with their sticks and stuff,” court documents state.

Baranyi told the reporter, court documents say, "it was a joke to them until we got inside and then guns came out, but we're at a point now, it can't be allowed to stand. We have to do something. People have to do something."

Baranyi then held up his bloody hand again, court papers say, and said, "because this could be you or your kids." 

The FBI matched the video to Baranyi's New Jersey drivers license picture.
