An Athens man and his cousin from Mississippi were sentenced to federal prison time Monday for their part in the breach of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

According to the U.S. Department of Justice, Donnie Duane Wren, 44, of Athens, was sentenced to 1 year and one day in prison and 24 months of supervised release.

His cousin Thomas Harlen Smith, 45, of Mathiston, Miss., was sentenced to nine years in prison and 36 months of supervised release. A jury convicted Wren of two felonies and one misdemeanor, and Smith of 11 charges, including nine felonies and two misdemeanors, on May 5.

According to evidence presented during the trial, Smith traveled from his Mississippi home and picked up Wren. They continued on to Washington, D.C., to attend a rally held by former President Trump on the day electoral votes in the 2020 presidential election were to be certified by Congress.

On the morning of Jan. 6, 2021, Smith and Wren attended the rally and afterward made their way toward the U.S. Capitol building. Before entering Capitol grounds, Smith climbed a column near the African American History Museum with the former Mississippi state flag containing the Confederate battle emblem.

Arriving on the Capitol grounds, Smith and Wren saw other rioters climbing scaffolding erected around the stage for the Presidential Inauguration. They then climbed and made their way to the Capitol’s Lower West Terrace Tunnel.

Smith pushed toward the front of a group of rioters and used a flagpole like a spear five times to try to break a window next to the Lower West Terrace doors. He then surged through the doorway, where he and a mass of other rioters pushed into a line of Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) officers attempting to hold the door shut.

According to prosecutors, Smith exited the tunnel and reunited with Wren, where they posed for a photograph together on the Lower West Terrace. Smith and Wren then climbed up a railing to the Upper West Terrace and confronted a line of police officers with riot shields and attempting to clear the area.

The two men pushed back against the police line, placing their hands on the officer’s shields and leaning back into the police. Wren leaned all his weight into the riot shield, preventing the police officer from advancing as police attempted to clear the area.

While this occurred, Smith witnessed an object fly past him and hit an officer. Smith yelled at the officer, “You deserve that, you piece of s—!” At 4:35 p.m., Smith kicked an MPD officer in the back—sending the officer to the ground. Smith picked up a metal pole-like object and threw it toward the line of police, striking two MPD officers in the head.

Later that day, on Facebook, Smith described the assault on the Capitol: “Patriots stood together and battled the tyrannical cops throughout the entire afternoon.”

Wren was convicted of civil disorder and assaulting, impeding, or resisting officers, both felonies, and a single misdemeanor charge of entering and remaining in a restricted building or grounds.

This case was prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia and the National Security Division’s Counterterrorism Section. The U.S. Attorney’s Offices for the Northern District of Mississippi, the Northern District of Alabama and the Southern District of Florida worked on the case.

According to the DOJ, in the 33 months since Jan. 6, 2021, more than 1,100 individuals have been charged in nearly all 50 states for crimes related to the Capitol breach, including more than 400 individuals charged with felony assaulting or impeding law enforcement. The investigation remains ongoing.