Pardoned Jan. 6 rioter seen smashing Speaker's Lobby door charged with burglary
A Virginia man who was pardoned by the Trump administration after being seen smashing the Speaker's Lobby door during Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol was charged with burglary.
Henrico County police responded to a call for breaking and entering on May 9. The police officers spoke with the homeowners, who said that around 8:30 p.m. local time, an unknown man entered their home in Arthurwood Place through the back door.
The individual allegedly took 'several' items before being observed by people in the house and was asked to leave, Henrico County police said in an emailed statement on Tuesday.
Law enforcement on Tuesday identified the suspect as Zachary Jordan Alam, 33, of Centreville, Va., who they said was arrested in a neighborhood near the crime scene.
Alam was charged with residential breaking and entering and vandalism, according to Henrico County police. The statement did not specify the date of the charges.
Upon returning to the office in January, President Trump pardoned nearly all Jan. 6 defendants.
'What they've done to these people is outrageous,' the president said at the time.
Alam was convicted on charges related to smashing the glass panes of the Speaker's Lobby door with a black helmet. He was sentenced to eight years in prison in November last year.
'I believe in my heart that I was doing the right thing,' Alam said in court at the time, referring to his actions following Trump's 'Stop the Steal' rally.
Prosecutors previously said that Alam assisted other rioters in scaling barriers. When he was inside the Capitol building, he allegedly threw a red velvet rope from the balcony at law enforcement and attempted to kick a door on the fourth floor.
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Los Angeles Times
16 minutes ago
- Los Angeles Times
Can Elon Musk get Tesla back on track? Here are four road bumps
After a tumultuous months-long period by President Trump's side, Elon Musk is turning his attention back to his companies, including the stumbling electric vehicle maker Tesla Inc. Musk announced on X last week that his time as a special government employee was over. Tesla investors welcomed the news, hoping that Musk's departure from Washington would boost his car company's reputation and lagging performance. Since Musk began his role leading the White House advisory team called the Department of Government Efficiency in January, Tesla's stock has fallen roughly 12%. On Tuesday, the shares closed at $332, down 3.5%. The Austin, Texas-based company — which has a significant manufacturing operation in Fremont, Calif., and is the dominant EV company in the state — has been the subject of protests and vandalism as Musk, the company's chief executive, aligned himself with Trump and made controversial spending cuts on behalf of the federal government. The brand damage spread outside the U.S. to Europe, where monthly sales in 32 countries fell nearly 50% in April. 'It was very important for Musk to end this chapter and start working on Tesla's next stage of growth,' Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives said. 'Now he can get back to what he's supposed to be doing.' As the executive shifts his focus back to Tesla, here are four challenges experts say he must tackle: By associating himself with the president and the Trump administration's erratic actions, Musk alienated a large swath of his customers. Many Tesla drivers are liberal-leaning, industry analysts said, and were drawn to the company's environmental mission to take gas cars off the road. In protest over Musk's activities, some Tesla drivers, including celebrities, began selling or getting rid of their vehicles. Others sported new bumper stickers that said, 'I bought this before we knew Elon was crazy.' In February, Tesla topped the list of brands that lost the most resale value year over year, according to data provided by Karl Brauer, an analyst with The price of a used Tesla Model S and Model Y each dropped by about 16% in February from a year earlier. 'Price is a reflection of supply and demand,' Brauer said. 'So it could be that nobody wants to buy them anymore, or that there's a massive influx of them available, or both.' Now that he's left Washington, Musk will have to prove that his attention is on Tesla and that he isn't prioritizing political agendas. Ives estimated that about 5% to 10% of the brand damage sustained during Musk's stint in the capital will be permanent. 'Tesla has become a political symbol around the world and that's not a good thing,' said Ives, who has an 'outperform' rating on Tesla's stock. 'But there are much brighter days ahead now that Musk is no longer in the White House.' Musk has made lofty promises for years about the capabilities of Tesla's self-driving technology and plans for a robotaxi service. Though he has often over-exaggerated his progress, Musk has taken important steps toward commercializing autonomous driving technology. The future of his company depends on whether he can follow through, experts said. 'Musk's top priority should be autonomy and robotics,' Ives said. 'With these technologies, I believe Tesla's market cap could reach $2 trillion.' The company is currently valued at just over $1 trillion. According to claims Musk has made, Tesla drivers will one day be able to sleep in their car as it drives them across the country. Tesla's robotaxis will roam city streets, and humanoid robots dubbed Optimus will perform everyday tasks. Brauer compared the emergence of autonomous driving technology to a change on the scale of the internet or smartphones. But it's still far off, he said. Although the driverless taxi company Waymo is already operating in a few cities including Santa Monica, it could take 10 to 15 years for the technology to become widely accessible and integrated into society, Brauer said. Tesla remains the dominant force in the electric vehicle market, but rapidly increasing competition from traditional carmakers and other EV manufacturers have thinned sales, Brauer said. Major manufacturers including Ford and Chevy have released lines of their own electric vehicles, while promising startups such as Irvine-based Rivian have cut into Tesla's market share. At the same time, demand for electric vehicles is plateauing as the market gets saturated, Brauer said. Tesla's profit plummeted 71% in the first quarter to $409 million as the company faced a flurry of setbacks, including a falloff in automotive sales and rising competition. To keep up and remain viable, Tesla will have to reassess aspects of its business model. 'Many people, I think including Musk himself, have realized that the current business model is pretty much played out,' Brauer said. 'He's not going to substantially increase his revenue and his profit selling these same electric cars.' Tesla could receive a boost in sales if it successfully launched an affordable model accessible to more customers, but despite rumors and claims by executives, a release date has not been announced. The company could be further hurt by the loss of a $7,500 federal electric vehicle credit, which encourages sales and is likely to be eliminated by the Trump administration. While chargers for electric vehicles are ubiquitous in many parts of California, infrastructure is lacking throughout large areas of the country — and that's a problem. For the U.S. to rely more heavily on EVs, significant progress has to be made on the network of charging stations, Brauer said. Finding a time and place to charge is an obstacle for many Tesla drivers and limits the range of customers Tesla can reach. The lack of a fully comprehensive charging network would also hinder Musk's plans to operate a nationwide robotaxi service, Brauer said. In California, many chargers are broken or have been intentionally damaged by protesters.
Los Angeles Times
16 minutes ago
- Los Angeles Times
Voters wanted immigration enforcement, but not like this
Many voters elected President Trump to end border chaos. Illegal immigration remains low, but voters' opinions of his immigration policies as a whole have soured. The reason is that they view Trump's actions away from the border as just more chaos. Americans aren't against enforcement. But not like this. So what's the root problem — and what's the real fix? The public's perception of chaos stems from the fact that Trump's policies appear arbitrary. Under President Biden, no one knew why people were getting into the country. Now no one knows why people are getting thrown out. Under Biden, people came illegally or chaotically. Now people are being deported illegally or chaotically. The public cares about order in both directions. America shouldn't be doomed to oscillate between two types of chaos. Instead, we need to reembrace the antidote for chaos: the rule of law. In popular speech, the 'rule of law' often just means following whatever the government says. But our nation's founders meant something else entirely. For them, the rule of law was the opposite of the 'rule of men' — which leaves government dictates, and the fate of residents, to the leaders' whims in the moment. The founders saw the rule of law as general predictable rules publicly known to and applicable to all. As James Madison wrote, 'Law is defined to be a rule of action; but how can that be a rule, which is little known, and less fixed?' For Madison, the hallmark of the rule of man was 'instability' (i.e. chaos). The separation of powers provided the Madisonian cure. 'The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands,' he said, 'may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny' because 'the life and liberty of the subject would be exposed to arbitrary control.' Arbitrariness is just chaos by another name. During Biden's term, much of the border chaos traces to the fact that immigrants never really knew what the rule was. On paper, it was illegal to cross between ports and legal to cross at them. In reality, at least from 2021 to 2023, ports were mostly closed, and about half of the illegal crossers were allowed to stay. Moreover, the actual determination of who got in and who got tossed was made by agents at the border, not based on asylum statutes passed by Congress or any other known rule. This was the rule of man, not the rule of law, and the chaotic results were readily apparent. Unfortunately, the chaos has not dissipated — it's only moved locations: from the border to the interior. The basic framework of Trump's interior enforcement is that it is whimsical and arbitrary. It is not about 'merit,' not about public safety threats, not even about people here illegally or about 'noncitizens,' as Trump is seeking to strip U.S. citizenship from people and remove U.S. citizenship for many U.S.-born children.. There's no articulable rule. Consider that Trump is arresting highly educated, lawful immigrant students for op-eds written long ago. Setting aside the 1st Amendment, the founders would be — or actually were — equally aghast at the 'subjecting of men to punishment for things which, when they were done, were breaches of no law, and the practice of arbitrary imprisonments.' The rule of man is back, and it's as chaotic as ever. Trump has empowered agents to strip immigrants of lawful status and immediately deport them. They are even arresting lawful immigrants based on secret criteria (like forbidden tattoos) and sending them without due process to a foreign prison. Judge. Jury. Executioner. R.I.P. Madison's definition of tyranny. All this is unnecessary. Restoring the rule of law can end the chaos. That starts with clear, consistent and predictable rules. The immigration rules were, before Trump, notoriously known as 'second only to the Internal Revenue Code in complexity.' The policies rapidly change from administration to administration and even from month to month. The U.S. needs straightforward, transparent policies on immigration. When the government accuses someone of being in violation of the law, clear rules would enable rapid implementation in accordance with due process. This enforcement would naturally channel people into legal ways to enter and live in the United States. Once someone is granted a legal way to enter, that decision should not be reopened — absent some significant new facts. America can end the immigration chaos. This vision of an immigration policy animated by the rule of law is achievable, but no one in government has focused on achieving it. David J. Bier is the director of immigration studies at the Cato Institute.
Los Angeles Times
16 minutes ago
- Los Angeles Times
Glendale jail is holding ICE detainees, an outlier in California, as immigration arrests rise
Immigrants detained by federal agents in Southern California are being housed at the Glendale City Jail, making the Los Angeles suburb one of the few, if not the only, known jurisdiction in the 'sanctuary' state to sidestep rules prohibiting local law enforcement from assisting in federal immigration enforcement. It's unclear how many detainees are being held at the 96-bed facility, but The Times confirmed at least two individuals were placed there over the last week by immigration officials. The facility is one of the busiest jails in the state and is staffed by the Glendale Police Department. Glendale City Council members defended the detentions this week, saying that the city had an 18-year-old contract with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, to temporarily house noncriminal detainees. They said the agreement is in compliance with state Senate Bill 54, a landmark law that made California the first in the nation to create a sanctuary state. 'Glendale has a contract with ICE, and yes, on occasion, ICE detainees will be given bed space at our facility,' said Annette Ghazarian, a spokesperson for Glendale. Shortly before President Trump took office, Glendale Police Chief Manuel Cid told the council that the jails hadn't been used frequently for immigrant detainees since the Obama administration. He said that the mass sweeps would be logistically difficult given the capacity of the federal detention centers and that he didn't expect local agencies to fill the gap given state law. But advocates fear that is exactly what's happening. They believe that Glendale's arrangement takes advantage of a loophole in state sanctuary laws that omit standing contracts. And it raises questions about the state law amid ramped up enforcement efforts by the Trump administration, which has said it aims to arrest 3,000 undocumented immigrants daily. 'It is deeply, deeply troublesome,' said Andres Kwon, senior policy counsel at the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California. 'This contract very much goes against the principle and value of creating a bright line between local resources and federal immigration enforcement.' At a minimum, Kwon said the contract should end immediately. 'This is where the attorney general has jurisdiction and responsibility to review and oversee how Glendale is acting pursuant to this contract,' he said. The attorney general also has a mandate to review and report on conditions of confinement, which it has yet to do. Other municipalities terminated their contracts after then-Gov. Jerry Brown signed SB 54, which prohibited local and state municipalities from using funds for federal immigration enforcement purposes, including the use of jail facilities. But Glendale's then-Police Chief Robert Castro, who opposed the law, did not. And at the time, the city manager warned against nixing the contract in a bid to maintain a good relationship with federal authorities. Jennie Quinonez-Skinner, a resident of Glendale, said she has been urging council members to abandon the contract since learning about it during the first Trump administration. 'They can end if they want to, they just don't want to,' she said. 'I see no justification for doing it. Under the current administration, with lack of due process, it's harmful.' At the time the contract was signed in 2007, the federal government promised to pay Glendale $85 a day for each detainee. Nearly 10 years later in 2016, the city reported that it received a little more than $6,000 for its services in one year. City documents show the contract terms are indefinite and 'may be terminated by either party with 60 days' written notice.' At the Glendale City Council meeting Tuesday night, immigration lawyer Sarah Houston, whose client had been detained at the jail and been without food for nine hours due to being transferred between multiple facilities, questioned why Glendale was adhering to a decades-old agreement that runs afoul of SB 54. 'We have SB 54 that says very explicitly, local law enforcement cannot provide resources, including cells, to immigration enforcement. California is a sanctuary state,' Houston said at the meeting. 'Do you want Glendale to be one of the only cities that allows local police departments to work with the Department of Homeland Security, so that they can just house and detain a lot of our immigrant sisters and brothers?' Glendale Councilmember Elen Asatryan tried to distance the city from immigration operations. 'We do not get involved, we are not even booking them, they are using the cells as a holding place in the city of Glendale,' Asatryan said. She disputed that detainees were not being provided food or water. The use of the Glendale City Jail to hold migrants has come up in recent weeks as the Trump administration pushes to increase the number of immigrant arrests by targeting them as they leave the courtroom. Immigration officials admit the effort has stressed their own resources as they look to increase capacity. ICE has about 7,000 beds in California with six privately owned facilities and has been looking to expand its footprint in the state as its enforcement begins to outstrip its detention space. 'U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's enhanced enforcement operations and routine daily operations have resulted in a significant number of arrests of criminal aliens that require greater detention capacity,' said Richard Beam, an ICE spokesman. 'While we cannot confirm individual pre-decisional conversations, we can confirm that ICE is exploring all options to meet its current and future detention requirements.' In Los Angeles, Santa Ana and around the country, masked federal agents in plain clothes have been arresting migrants as they leave their immigration hearings, often after a government lawyer asks that their deportation proceedings be dismissed. Family members who come to support their loved-ones often are left distraught. Typically, someone arrested by ICE in public would be transferred to a detention facility, but the rush of detaineesprobably strained the system and forcedofficials to look for other options, said Melissa Shepard, legal services director at Immigrant Defenders Law Center. 'I can imagine it will be an influx for detention centers that probably don't have the resources in place to keep all of these folks,' Shepard said. 'In Southern California, the detention centers were quite unprepared for the number of people being detained.' Times reporters witnessed more than half a dozen arrests at courthouses in downtown Los Angeles and Santa Ana courthouses Monday. In Los Angeles, Jianhui Wu, of China, was detained after the government moved to dismiss his case and seek expedited removal proceedings. The judge granted the man another hearing in August to give him time to find an attorney, telling him 'you need to talk to someone competent' about his case. But as he left the courtroom, a plainclothes ICE agent followed him, while another stopped him in the hallway. One agent took the man's backpack as they handcuffed him and swiftly took him down a service elevator. By Tuesday, he was being held at the Glendale City Jail.
