Another Montanan faces federal charges for his alleged involvement with the insurgency at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6th. Isaac Sturgeon, a lawn care business owner from Dillon, was arrested at JFK Airport in New York on Saturday.
The federal government has charged Sturgeon on eight counts, including obstruction of justice; assaulting, resisting or impeding certain officers; civil disorder; entering and remaining in a restricted building or grounds; disorderly and disruptive conduct in a restricted building or grounds; engaging in physical violence in a restricted building or grounds; impeding passage through the Capitol grounds or buildings, and an act of physical violence in the Capitol grounds or buildings.
A Federal Bureau of Investigation affidavit says police body cameras captured footage of Sturgeon helping shove a metal barricade into metro police officers during the insurrection. The federal agency also used tips and social media to identify the Dillon resident.
Sturgeon’s Instagram account shows multiple photos and videos, some with him posing in them, at the Capitol during the Jan. 6th insurgency.
Sturgeon flew to Kenya on Jan. 24th but was deported before his return flight home.
In 2019, Sturgeon said he was considering joining the Montana National Guard in a news story from TV station KXLF. A Montana National Guard recruiter told YPR Sturgeon did not join, saying Sturgeon “made a few mistakes with the law” but was not at liberty to say more. The Dillon Tribune reported Sturgeon was charged with Operating with Expired Registration - Failure to Reregister in 2018.
Sturgeon was abroad last spring for “skydiving instruction,” according to a press release from Republican Senator Steve Daines, and stuck in Morocco when commercial flights closed down due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The press release says Sturgeon’s father reached out to Daines’s office, which contacted the State Department to charter a flight for Americans. Daines made a request to reserve a seat for Isaac. Daines helped more than 100 Montanans return home during the early days of the pandemic, according to his spokesperson..
Three other Montanans have been charged with crimes related to the Capitol attack.
