COLUSA COUNTY, Calif. — COLLEGE PARK, Md. (AP) — A California architect has been sentenced to probation for joining the mob that stormed the U.S. Capitol. The judge who sentenced Valerie Elaine Ehrke on Friday noted that she played a relatively minimal role in the Jan. 6 insurrection.
Justice Department prosecutors said they recommended a probationary sentence for Ehrke because she was inside the Capitol for about one minute, only stepped about 15 feet into the building, and didn’t engage in any violence or property destruction.
Ehrke is one of about 70 defendants who have pleaded guilty to riot-related charges. She was the seventh Capitol riot defendant to be sentenced.
Valerie Ehrke's charges were as follows: Entering and remaining Entering and Remaining in a Restricted Building; Disorderly and Disruptive Conduct in a Restricted Building; Violent Entry and Disorderly Conduct in a Capitol Building; Parading, Demonstrating, or Picketing in a Capitol Building.
Ehrke pled not guilty to all counts, according to the Department of Justice.
The lawsuit states she knowingly entered the building and "willfully and knowingly engaged in disorderly and disruptive conduct" while in the Capitol building.
An anonymous caller told the FBI that someone with "a close relation" to them had posted a video on Facebook inside the U.S. Capitol building during the riots, according to an FBI report.
The Department of Justice shows a video from a first-person perspective of the accounts that happened on Jan. 6.
"A check of the public Facebook page belonging to EHRKE with the display name “Valerie Elaine Ehrke” showed a video posted on January 6, 2021, at 2:09 p.m.," according to the Department of Justice.
The Facebook profile picture also showed a "flaming 'Q' and a map commonly associated with QAnon," according to the FBI report.
The FBI also found that Ehrke flew to D.C. from Sacramento International Airport on Jan. 5 and left D.C. on Jan. 9 to come back to Sacramento. When the FBI questioned Ehrke, she told them that she had traveled to D.C., confirming what they found. She said she was there to attend a rally for President Trump where she said she heard him "tell the crowd to go to the U.S. Capitol, and he would go with them."
Ehrke said she made it about 15 feet into the building before being pushed outside, according to the FBI report.
Based on the information from Ehrke, the FBI arrested her on Jan. 19 on multiple charges including "knowingly entering or remaining in any restricted building or grounds without lawful authority" as well as "knowingly, and with intent to impede or disrupt the orderly conduct of Government business or official functions." She was also arrested for being inside the Capitol building by "engaging in disorderly or disruptive conduct."
