One of the youngest people ever to be charged in a Jan. 6 case, a then-high school student who sat in former Vice President Mike Pence’s chair during the Capitol incident, was on Wednesday sentenced to one year behind bars.
Judge Randolph D. Moss issued the sentencing decision on July 26 at the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, according to court documents.
At the hearing, the judge ordered Bruno Joseph Cua, who was 18 when he entered the Capitol building on Jan. 6, 2021, and sat in a Senate floor chair reserved for the vice president, to serve one year in prison followed by 36 months of supervised release.
Mr. Cua, now 21, apologized in court for his actions on Jan. 6, telling the judge that “everything that day was just one terrible decision after another,” according to The Associated Press.
‘Tragic Case’
The judge was cited in the report as saying he was prepared to hand down a more severe sentence but relented after hearing Mr. Cua’s statement in court, saying he thinks the defendant showed genuine remorse.
“It’s a tragic case for the country. It’s a tragic case for you and your family,” the judge said, per AP. “There are no winners in any of this.”
Mr. Moss decided the case against Mr. Cua without a jury in February 2023, convicting him of obstructing the Jan. 6 congressional proceeding and assaulting a federal officer.
‘Detached From Reality’
Prosecutors had argued for a much longer sentence of nearly five years, saying Mr. Cua planned his actions weeks in advance, brought weapons to the Capitol, tried to terrorize congressional staffers, and was repeatedly aggressive toward police.
Mr. Cua’s attorneys, by contrast, argued in court documents (pdf) that prosecutors’ sentencing recommendations were “detached from reality” and sought to portray the defendant’s actions as violent where they were “fairly mundane.”
By Tom Ozimek
