The FBI said this image from a police officer's bodycam shows Thomas Webster (circled in green) of Orange County, N.Y., during the riot at the U.S.
Capitol in Washington, D.C., Jan. 6, 2021. (DOJ/FBI) WASHINGTON (AP) - Body camera video captured a "rage-filled" retired New York Police Department officer attacking one of the outnumbered police officers trying to hold off a mob of rioters who stormed the U.S.
Capitol, a federal prosecutor told jurors Tuesday.But a defense attorney said another video from a different angle shows that former New York City police officer Thomas Webster acted in self-defense after a Metropolitan Police Department officer punched him first.Jurors saw both videos at the start of Webster's trial, the first among dozens of cases in which a defendant is charged with assaulting police at the Capitol on Jan.
6, 2021.Assistant U.S. Attorney Hava Mirell also showed jurors a photo of Webster holding a U.S. Marine Corps flag on a metal pole in front of the Washington monument before the riot erupted."He is smiling in that photo, but that smile would soon turn to rage," she said during the trial's opening statements.The prosecutor told jurors they will hear testimony from Noah Rathbun, the officer whom Webster is charged with assaulting with the flag pole.Webster shoved a bike rack at Rathbun before swinging the flag pole at the officer in a downward chopping motion, striking a metal barricade in front of the officer, according to Mirell.