Richard “Bigo” Barnett is a tad less brave, it appears, now that he realizes he can’t carry a high-voltage stun gun with him to prison — you know, like the one he carried into the nation’s Capitol during the riots of Jan. 6, 2021.
Shortly after Barnett, 63, was sentenced Wednesday to 4 1/2 years in a federal prison, the Gravette man asked the court to recommend that he not have to report to prison before Aug. 22. That, he said, is so that he can get his affairs in order for his “significant other,” who he said is disabled.
More interesting, though, is Barnett’s request that he be sent to a minimum-security prison camp with no violent offenders and with work and psychological programs, even if the prison is more than 500 miles from his home.
“For example, Mr. Barnett’s first choice in Yankton, South Dakota, is 545 miles away, and the others are also outside of 500 miles,” Barnett’s attorney, Jonathan Gross, wrote in the motion filed Wednesday. You can read the full Barnett-Prison Motion.
Barnett was convicted in January in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., of eight federal crimes, including theft of government property, obstruction of an official proceeding, and entering a a restricted building with a deadly or dangerous weapon — the stun gun attached to a walking stick.
Barnett became notorious for a picture in which he posed with one foot propped on a desk in then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi‘s office.