Reffitt’s defense lawyer defended his release, downplaying his words about violence as just small talk.
Faruqui decided to keep Reffitt in prison pending trial.
The judge’s decision provoked a cry from the family on the court’s teleconference line. Reffitt’s wife, daughter and daughter’s boyfriend met for the hearing on the line, with the daughter’s boyfriend also having testified in court Monday.
“[It] it is not an easy thing to say, but I think that is what the law requires in this case. … This clearly caused a huge burden for his family, “Faruqui said at Monday’s hearing.
Reffitt reportedly drove to Washington with weapons in his car days before January 6 alongside another unidentified member of the extremist paramilitary group Three Percenters, according to the Justice Department’s case file.
After the attack, he returned home to Texas – where he was greeted by his 16-year-old daughter and 18-year-old son, who disapproved of his pro-Trump policy. The trio argued, with Reffitt telling his daughter that he would put a bullet in his cell phone if she posted about him on social media, according to court records and his testimony at Monday’s hearing. He finally told his daughter and son that, if they reported him, they would be traitors and “traitors are shot,” testified his daughter.
The hearing was at least the third time that Reffitt’s family members gave the authorities details about him.
The daughter also testified about her father to a grand jury, according to Monday’s procedures.
“He’s not a violent person. He just says things. He talks a lot … That’s just him being a drama queen,” she said at the hearing. “I wasn’t scared, I think. It was annoying in a way.”
In the days after the attack, Guy Reffitt was recorded speaking inside his home, and prosecutors now have audio recordings, according to court records. At home, Reffitt talked about the video he had made on January 6, bragged and defended his part in the riot and called it “a preface” because he promised he wasn’t finished.
The judge said he believed Reffitt could still be a danger to the community, especially because of the firearms he holds, his statements about future violence and additional messages he sent to other Trump supporters who supported a revolt against the American government. . Faruqui also observed a muffler owned by Reffitt for a gun, which was found in his home.
When Reffitt and the other Three Percenters drove to Washington in early January, he brought an AR-15 rifle and a pistol, prosecutors said. Prosecutors say Reffitt, dressed in armor, carried the pistol and plastic handcuffs as he advanced toward a police line that protected the Capitol. When investigators later searched his home and found his weapons, Reffitt at first told them that the gun muffler he had was a “fuel filter”.
Reffitt had also sent messages in advance about “marching with heat” and, after the turmoil, sent messages to others about changing his target to mainstream media and technology companies, according to the Justice Department’s case file.
He also reportedly wrote for another three percent, prosecutors say, through a messaging app about taking Capitol “again”.
The extremist group Three Percenters tried to parallel what its members believe was a small armed group of American revolutionaries who fought against the British in the Revolutionary War, prosecutors say. It is one of a handful of extremist groups active during the Trump era that federal investigators investigated while trying to gain more understanding of planning and coordination before the Capitol riot.
Prosecutors also said at Monday’s hearing that a leader of the Three Percenters was interrogated and later arrested, but did not provide further details or a name.