Man who smashed glass in door on Jan. 6 before Ashli Babbitt shooting sentenced

A Virginia man who was charged for smashing the glass of a door at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, was sentenced to eight years in prison Thursday.

Zachary Jordan Alam, 32, convicted of eight felonies and three misdemeanor offenses last year, broke the glass panes of the Speaker’s Lobby door with a black helmet shortly before Ashli Babbitt tried to climb through the broken area and was fatally shot by a Capitol Police officer.

The shooting, which was captured on video, transformed Babbitt, an Air Force veteran, into a martyr for the political right, which has portrayed her killing as unjust. 

On Thursday, U.S. District Judge Dabney L. Friedrich sentenced Alam, of Centreville, Va. to eight years in prison, 36 months of supervised release and ordered him to pay $4,484 in restitution, according to the press release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia.

“A significant sentence is needed ‘to afford adequate deterrence to criminal conduct’ by others. The need to deter others is especially strong in cases involving domestic terrorism, which the breach of the Capitol certainly was,” prosecutors said in the court filing.

Alam, who attended then-President Trump’s “Stop the Steal” rally earlier in the day, assisted other rioters in scaling barriers. While inside the Capitol building, he threw a red velvet rope from a balcony at police officers and tried to kick a door on the fourth floor of the building. 

FBI arrested Alam on Jan. 30, 2021, in Denver, Pa., according to the release.

“I believe in my heart that I was doing the right thing,” Alam said in court, The Associated Press reported. “Sometimes you have to break the rules to do what’s right.”

Since the attack on the Capitol, more than 1,500 rioters have been charged in nearly all 50 states — including nearly 600 who were charged for felonies related to assaulting or impeding law enforcement.

Trump, who was declared the winner of the 2024 presidential election early Wednesday, vowed throughout his campaign that he would pardon the rioters. Now, the Jan. 6 defendants and their attorneys are hoping he keeps that promise.