U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly said the 46-month sentence reflected the gravity of the charges against Lonnie Coffman, 72, who had pleaded not guilty to possession of an unregistered firearm. Coffman’s sentence is the third longest for a man accused of rioting in the Capitol, after 63 months and 51 months in prison for assaulting police officers during an attack on Congress by supporters of former President Donald Trump. Of the more than 100 defendants convicted so far, most have been sentenced to probation or short sentences of less than two months. “He had a small arsenal in his truck, ready to fight,” Kollar-Kotelly said during a sentencing hearing. “I still can not understand why he had this.” Coffman has been in custody since his arrest on Jan. 6 and will receive praise for his time. Coffman’s lawyer argued that further imprisonment was not justified in light of his age, health, Vietnam War veteran status, remorse and acceptance of responsibility. The police officers arrested Kofman near Capitol, having observed the grip of a weapon in his truck, and responded to bombs with tubes left outside the headquarters of the Republican National Commission and the Republican National Commission, which are both near the Capitol. Inside Coffman’s truck, police found an AR-15 rifle, a shotgun, a crossbow, several knives, smoke grenades and 11 Molotov cocktails. They also found a note with the name of at least one member of Congress and a judge, with the note “bad”. Prosecutors said at the time that the combination of weapons and political messages “suggests that these weapons were intended to be used in an attempt to violently attack our elected representatives”. Some 800 people are facing criminal charges over the invasion of the Capitol by Trump supporters, who forced lawmakers to hide during the certification of President Joe Biden’s election victory.
