FBI arrests Snohomish man accused of attacking Capitol Police on January 6

Federal agents from the FBI arrested a 47-year-old man in Snohomish on Thursday on suspicion of attacking police officers during the January 6 uprising.

According to a criminal complaint filed Thursday in U.S. District Court for DC, Derek Noftsger flew from Seattle to Baltimore and arrived in Washington, DC on January 4, 2021.

As crowds of Trump supporters and others marched to the Capitol to prevent the certification of the 2020 presidential election, Noftsger and another Washington man, Thomas Hodo, were seen on camera footage carrying a tattered U.S. flag, tearing down police barriers, shouting at police officers and advancing with the crowd, prosecutors said.

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Photos included with the indictment, taken from body-worn camera footage, allegedly show Noftsger picking up a police officer's riot shield and throwing it over his head at a line of officers. Minutes later, rioters overran the police lines and Noftsger allegedly climbed a scaffold on the Capitol's Lower West Terrace. He and Hodo are seen in the indictment posing for photos on the scaffold.

The FBI said Hodo was captured on open-source camera footage while on the patio saying, “It could be a lot worse. We came in peace this time. It could be a lot worse. Believe me, we are well armed if we need to be.”

It's unclear how federal agents tracked down Noftsger, how long it took to identify him, or why it took investigators 43 months to arrest him. However, court records show that one of Hodo's former co-workers helped investigators identify him.

Another Washington man charged in January 6 attack

Hodo is charged in the federal court criminal complaint with several misdemeanors, including disruptive conduct in a restricted building or grounds. Court documents link several social media posts to him, including one such post from Jan. 5, 2021, claiming that “antifa” threatened a senator's family by showing up at their home. “This is getting serious,” it says. In a video from the same day, Noftsger can be seen saying, “It's my time, my duty, and if I have to lose my life in DC for two days, that's exactly what I'm going to do,” the complaint says.

The next day, during the riots, Hodo was reportedly seen shouting at police through a microphone, “Any traitor will be hanged,” and then telling police officers, “You are a damn disgrace.”

Although the complaint accuses Hodo of throwing a can of suspected pepper spray mixture at police, he is not currently facing assault charges.

A few hours after his arrest on Thursday, Noftsger appeared for the first time in federal court in downtown Seattle.

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At the time of publication, Hodo had not yet been arrested.

FBI agents in Seattle and across Washington continue to investigate the case.

To date, federal prosecutors have charged nearly 1,500 people with crimes committed at the Capitol on January 6, 2020. More than a third of the charges are capital crimes for allegedly assaulting or obstructing police.

Sam Campbell is a reporter, editor and anchor at KIRO Newsradio. Read more of Sam's stories here Here. Follow Sam on Xor email him here.