WASHINGTON — A federal judge convicted a Washington state Proud Boy and member of the anti-government sovereign citizen movement on Tuesday of seven counts for storming the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, as part of a pro-Trump mob.
D.C. District Court Chief Judge James Boasberg found Marc Anthony Bru, 43, of Vancouver, guilty of five misdemeanor counts and two felony counts of civil disorder and obstruction of an official proceeding. Bru declined to offer a defense and said little during the hearing Tuesday except repeatedly telling Boasberg he did not consent to the trial.
“You are outside of your jurisdiction,” Bru said in lieu of giving a closing argument. “You have trafficked me and you have committed war crimes against me.”
During a short bench trial, prosecutors said Bru traveled to D.C. on Jan. 6 not intending to attend former President Donald Trump’s “Stop the Steal” rally but instead to try to prevent the certification of the 2020 presidential election. Bru, a member of the Vancouver chapter of the Proud Boys, met up with members of the far-right group and marched on the Capitol. There he joined other rioters in pushing on bike rack barricades police were attempting to use to hold a perimeter and yelled at officers that they were going to “die for the corporation.” Many members of the sovereign citizen movement believe the U.S. government is not a legitimate government but rather a corporation – something Bru expressed himself in court Tuesday.
After the building was breached by another Proud Boy, Dominic Pezzola, Bru made his way into the Senate gallery. Prosecutors said after returning home from D.C., Bru proposed to another Proud Boy that the group should overwhelm police in Portland, Oregon, like rioters had on Jan. 6 and remove politicians from power (a federal prosecutor pointed out in court Tuesday the capital of Oregon is Salem).
Bru was arrested in August 2021 and initially granted pretrial release. His release was revoked in July after he failed to appear for a previous bench trial. On Tuesday, Boasberg ordered Bru to remain in custody until his sentencing hearing on Jan. 8.
Bru will likely face a request from prosecutors for several years in prison. To date, members of the Proud Boys have received some of the most significant sentences in Jan. 6 cases, including the group’s former national chairman, Enrique Tarrio, who was sentenced to 22 years in prison last month. Pezzola, the Proud Boy who created the first breach into the building, received 10 years in prison.
In addition to his criminal case, Bru was also named alongside numerous other members of the Proud Boys and members of the Oath Keepers militia in a civil suit filed by the D.C. Attorney General's Office seeking damages for the Capitol riot. That lawsuit remains pending.