A former Oakland police officer was among the mob at the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday and says things got out of hand, but stopped short of criticizing the violence.
“The intention was for it to be peaceful. People were just frustrated and they were angry and they were at the front of the Capitol,” said Jurell Snyder, a U.S. Army veteran who served two tours in Iraq, speaking to KPIX-5’s Joe Vazquez. “The cops at the gate, they moved aside, gestured with their arms almost inviting them in. Almost like – I hate to say it – almost like a setup, like they wanted us to be disruptive. People were unable to hold that anger in.”
Snyder says he did not enter the building himself but attended President Trump’s rally beforehand, participated in protests outside the building and saw people enter.
While Snyder acknowledged that breaching the Capitol was illegal, he stopped short of criticizing the mob’s behavior.
“I think those people who trespassed into the Capitol building will be happy to take a criminal penalty of trespassing,” he said. “I think they’ll take that criminal trespassing if the Democrats who committed fraud take the criminal charges of treason.”
When asked about whether or not disrupting the federal government’s work to finalize election results is itself treasonous behavior, Snyder replied, “What do you think’s worse, Joe: storming the Capitol with a flag or committing treason against your country?”
He says that people were whipped up into a mob mentality after the rally, where President Trump encouraged the crowd to walk over to the Capitol and suggested he would join them. The President’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani called for “trial by combat” to settle the election results.
Snyder told KPIX-5 that there may be more demonstrations planned for Thursday.
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