A former Virginia police officer who testified against a friend and former supervisor he joined at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, avoided prison time on Aug. 16 for his role in it.
Former Rocky Mount Police Officer Jacob Fracker, who previously pleaded guilty to conspiring with his fellow officer to obstruct Congress from certifying Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory over then-President Donald Trump, was sentenced to one year of probation, with 59 days in home confinement.
U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper, an Obama appointee, handed down the sentence in federal court in Washington after Fracker expressed regret.
Former Rocky Mount Police Sgt. Thomas Robertson “didn’t tell me how to act that day,” Fracker said, adding, “I acted on my own, and for that I apologize.”
Robertson “recruited” Fracker to join the Capitol breach, according to prosecutors. Fracker agreed to cooperate with the government, pleading guilty to a single count, 18 U.S.C. § 371, before assisting the prosecution of Robertson, including testifying at his former supervisor’s trial.
Fracker, a Marine Corps veteran, told jurors that Robertson had invited him to Washington, D.C., to see Trump speak. The two off-duty officers traveled to Washington in the morning with a third man and donned gas masks as they approached the Capitol and joined a riot.
‘Great Personal Cost’
Prosecutors said that without Fracker, they wouldn’t have learned that Robertson destroyed two cell phones containing videos and photographs taken on Jan. 6, 2021.Fracker’s cooperation came at “great personal cost,” prosecutors said, noting that Robertson was not only Fracker’s colleague but also a father figure he sometimes referred to as “dad.”
Fracker faced up to five years in prison but given the cooperation, prosecutors recommended Fracker receive no jail time. They asked the judge to impose six months probation with a condition of community confinement or home detention, as well as supervised release of three years.
Fracker’s lawyers asked for no jail time and a sentence of probation or home confinement, saying he is “ashamed and embarrassed” for his actions on Jan. 6 and that he has “sought from an early stage to take responsibility for his actions,” including cooperating against his former mentor.
Fracker was the first Jan. 6 defendant to be sentenced for the conspiracy charge, and the first defendant to be sentenced after cooperating with the government.
Rocky Mount, a town of roughly 5,000 residents about a four-hour drive southwest of Washington, fired Robertson and Fracker after the Capitol breach.
Robertson and Fracker are among roughly 850 people who have been charged with federal crimes for their conduct on Jan. 6. More than 350 of them have pleaded guilty, mostly to misdemeanor offenses, and more than 230 have been sentenced.
