Prosecutors Allege Oath Keepers Stockpiled Weapons in Preparation for Capitol Attack
Prosecutors described evidence that members of the right-wing militia group had purchased more than $15,000 worth of firearms and related supplies in the days before the Jan. 6 storming of the Capitol.
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Federal prosecutors allege that the Oath Keepers militia group was prepared to move a stash of firearms and equipment from a Virginia hotel to rioters on Jan. 6 last year, claiming that Edward Vallejo, arrested recently on seditious-conspiracy and other charges, worked with others to coordinate what they called “quick reaction forces” stationed at a Comfort Inn in Arlington, Virginia, reports the Wall Street Journal. Some other alleged members of the group, including Thomas Caldwell, a Virginia man who served in the U.S. Navy, and Jessica Watkins, a former U.S. Army infantryman, were among the first to be arrested after the riot, and accused of developing a military-style plan to breach the Capitol.
Prosecutors have already accused Caldwell of discussing a plan to station a boatful of “weps,” or weapons, across the Potomac River from Washington as part of a quick reaction force. In the new indictment, in which both Caldwell and Watkins are named, and the accompanying detention memo for Vallejo, prosecutors described evidence that Rhodes had purchased more than $15,000 of firearms and related supplies in the days before the riot, including an “AR-platform rifle, sights, mounts, triggers, slings and additional firearms attachments” while he traveled to Washington, D.C., from Texas on Jan. 3, 2021. Prosecutors also allege that, after the riot, Rhodes and Vallejo continued to plot to try to thwart Biden’s inauguration.
