Greer, SC man charged in Jan. 6 Capitol riot wants trial, rejects initial plea deal
A South Carolina man arrested by the FBI in connection with the Jan. 6 Capitol riots has rejected an initial plea offer from federal prosecutors.
William “Robbie” Norwood III, who attended his hearing virtually Tuesday afternoon, is for the present choosing to go to trial, said his lawyer, Peter Cooper.
“It looks at this stage like the trial side,” Cooper told U.S. Judge Emmet Sullivan. “Obviously, things could change down the road.”
Norwood, of Greer, in the Upstate, was arrested in February and charged with knowingly entering or remaining in a restricted building without lawful authority, violent and disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds, obstruction of justice and theft of government property.
He stole a body armor vest and helmet belonging to the U.S. Capitol Police, according to a July 28 indictment in his case. They had a combined value of less than $1,000, the indictment said.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Hava Mirell said a plea agreement was offered to Norwood Oct. 24. Its contents were not disclosed.
Typically a government plea offer allows a defendant to plead guilty to one of several charges in an indictment or criminal complaint in return for dropping the other charges and having prosecutors recommend a light sentence or perhaps probation.
Mirell told the judge that in all the hundreds of criminal cases against alleged rioters, prosecutors have gathered and made available to defense lawyers more than 16,000 Capitol-area surveillance videos, including Secret Service video footage, police radio transmissions and Capitol Police body camera footage.
Prosecutors have also provided maps of the Capitol keyed to areas seen in the videotapes, she said.
Not all of that evidence trove pertains to Norwood. His attorney has been provided with specific digital evidence “related specifically to” Norwood so that his lawyer doesn’t have to search through “thousands and thousands of hours” of video, Mirell said. An electronic data bank of the government’s video evidence has been set up and is available to defense lawyers, she added.
Sullivan set Jan. 13 as the next date for another status conference on the case.
Norwood went to Washington to attend a rally for then-President Donald Trump, the complaint said.
On Jan. 6, Congress met to count the electoral votes in the Nov. 3 presidential election and certify Joe Biden as the winner. However, fueled by false charge of election fraud sparked by Trump and allies, rioters stormed the Capitol to stop the vote certification process, even though no evidence of massive fraud existed, according to Trump’s Attorney General, William Barr.
More than 150 police were injured, and one rioter was shot to death.
Exactly what happened that day and the riot’s causes are the subject of an ongoing congressional investigation.
“In the nine months since Jan. 6, more than 650 individuals have been arrested in nearly all 50 states for crimes related to the breach of the U.S. Capitol, including over 190 individuals charged with assaulting or impeding law enforcement,” according to the U.S. Attorney’s office in the District of Columbia.
A complaint in his case said Norwood was turned in to the FBI by a person who was connected to a text message group chat that Norwood sent texts to before and after the Capitol riots. Other evidence concerning Norwood includes video surveillance from inside the Capitol, the complaint said.
The complaint cites a text message Norwood allegedly sent to a group chat in which he said about the riot, “I got a nice helmet and body armor off a cop for God’s sake and I disarmed him. Tell me how that works.”
Norwood spoke only briefly at Tuesday’s hearing when the judge asked him how he was doing.
“I’m doing well, sir, how are you?” Norwood said.
“Good,” the judge said.
This story was originally published October 26, 2021 at 3:01 PM with the headline "Greer, SC man charged in Jan. 6 Capitol riot wants trial, rejects initial plea deal."