PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — Federal prosecutors say the Bucks County man accused of assaulting a Capitol police officer during the Jan. 6 insurrection has a violent past.
Ryan Samsel, 37, from Levittown, has asked to be released from federal custody after his lawyer says he was beaten in a Washington, D.C., jail.
Federal authorities said Samsel is seen in video from Jan. 6 outside the Capitol, pushing and pulling a barricade, yelling at police officers.
Law enforcement said that while pushing the barricade, he pushed down a female officer. She hit her head on a concrete step and was knocked out.
Federal prosecutors have argued Samsel should be held until trial. They say he has, in their words, a “pattern of choking and beating women to the point of loss of consciousness.”
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They detailed Samsel’s criminal history, saying that:
- In 2006, he was convicted of running a woman off the road, punching her windshield, and threatening to kill her because she owed him $60.
- In 2007, he was accused of knocking a man’s teeth out.
- In 2009, he was convicted of choking and beating a woman, while holding her against her will for five hours.
- In 2011, he was convicted of smashing hot pizza in his pregnant girlfriend’s face, pouring a beer over her head, throwing her in a canal and holding her head under water.
- In 2015, another woman accused him of choking her, with another such accusation in 2019.
Prosecutors say the police officer he knocked down has complications from her head injury.
If Samsel is released from federal custody, he’ll go to state prison in Pennsylvania, as he has a detainer for a parole violation.
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