2 Pennsylvania Men Charged in January Attack on US Capitol

Marshall Neefe, 25, of Newville, and Charles Bradford “Brad” Smith, 25, of Shippensburg, both face felony charges over their alleged roles in the Jan. 6 storming of the Capitol.

HARRISBURG  — Two central Pennsylvania men were arrested Monday and accused of participating in the mob attack on the US Capitol earlier this year, with their social media communications cited by federal prosecutors as evidence against them.

A US Justice Department news release said Marshall Neefe, 25, of Newville, and Charles Bradford “Brad” Smith, 25, of Shippensburg, both face felony charges over their alleged roles in the Jan. 6 storming of the Capitol.

Prosecutors said Neefe told Smith in early November he was “getting ready to storm D.C.” and then later wrote to him, “We goin? … Cause hot damn son I really wanna crack some commie skulls.”

Details were not available late Tuesday on the federal courts’ online records system. Messages were left Tuesday seeking comment from federal public defenders in Harrisburg and at a phone number linked to Neefe.

Prosecutors alleged that both men entered Capitol grounds. They said Neefe carried a wooden club and helped push a metal sign into a defensive police line. Neefe is also alleged to have later sent a Facebook message that said he wanted police officers who hurled batons or maced them to “be lined up and put down.”

Smith is purported to have sent a message on Facebook afterward saying “we literally chased them into hiding” and making an apparent reference to stopping certification. The mob had been attempting to stop Congress from certifying the presidential election results, but was unsuccessful. 

Prosecutors said Smith used Facebook to transmit a video in which he said, “We stormed the gates of the Capitol.”

Neefe is accused of assaulting, resisting, or impeding officers while using a dangerous weapon; carrying out an act of physical violence on Capitol grounds; and other charges. Smith’s charges include disorderly or disruptive conduct in a restricted building or grounds and conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding.