DC Police Officer Convicted for Obstructing Investigation into Proud Boys Leader

Conviction of Former D.C. Police Officer

A federal judge has convicted a former Washington, D.C. police officer for obstructing an investigation into Enrique Tarrio, the former national leader of the Proud Boys in the weeks before Jan. 6, 2021.

Former D.C. police Lt. Shane Lamond covered up his extensive communications with Tarrio about an investigation into Tarrio’s role in burning a Black Lives Matter banner in December 2020 after a pro-Trump march, U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson ruled Monday after a two-week bench trial.

Key Information Disclosure

Jackson said Lamond fed Tarrio crucial pieces of information about the banner-burning probe. That information helped Tarrio make plans about his own upcoming travel to Washington, D.C. — anticipating that he would be arrested — so he could guide the Proud Boys as they prepared to descend on Washington, D.C. for what later became the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. The far-right group, known for street fights with antifa activists, aligned itself with Trump after the 2020 election, and hundreds of its members formed the vanguard of the mob that breached the Capitol.

Legal Actions and Sentencing

Tarrio was convicted of seditious conspiracy last year for his role in orchestrating aspects of the attack and was sentenced to a 22-year prison term, the longest of any Jan. 6 defendant.

Jackson also found Lamond guilty on three charges of lying to investigators about his relationship with Tarrio.

Judge’s Commentary on Tarrio

In some ways, though, Jackson’s harshest commentary was reserved for Tarrio, who testified on Lamond’s behalf in the case. Jackson described Tarrio as “an awful witness” who appeared to be trying to “advance his own agenda” on the stand.

That agenda, she said, was not entirely clear but included efforts to attack the legitimacy of his seditious conspiracy conviction and appeared in some ways to be a bid to obtain a pardon, to reassert his leadership of and loyalty to the Proud Boys and to perhaps rebut suggestions he had been a “snitch.” She described him as “flippant,” “grandiose” and “obnoxious.”

Verdict and Sentencing

“That was Tarrio’s personal performance,” she said, agreeing not to hold his recalcitrant testimony against Lamond.

Nevertheless, Jackson said Lamond was guilty of the four charges he faced because he repeatedly misled colleagues about the extent of his contacts with Tarrio during the investigation of the banner burning. He initiated the use of Telegram, an encrypted communications app, for conversations with the Proud Boys leader and deleted their chats, and he repeatedly informed Tarrio about the status of the case against him.

Though Lamond told others that Tarrio was a key source of information about the Proud Boys movements in Washington, Jackson said that by December 2020 — “a critical time for the country,” she noted — the relationship had reversed, with Lamond acting more like Tarrio’s source.

Lamond’s sentencing is set for April 3.