UPDATED 1/22, 10:30 p.m. ET: Riley June Williams has been ordered by a federal judge to remain on house arrest in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. “She was released into the custody of her mother and will be fitted with a GPS monitoring device,” ABC News wrote of the 22-year-old who participated in the Capitol riot. She was instructed not to go near Washington, D.C.
The judge spoke pointedly of the Constitution while addressing Williams, who acted along with many MAGA and QAnon followers who misguidedly fancy themselves patriotic defenders of a white supremacist vision of America. "You are being released today because the Constitution has prevailed. I share that thought with you, as you leave here today, that your freedom, conditioned as it is by the orders that I've entered, is a result of the prevailing of the Constitution. And I'll leave you with this final thought Ms. Williams: The Constitution prevails here today, and the Constitution will always prevail in this country."
See original story below.
Sadly, the 2008 Coen Brothers crime comedy Burn After Reading wasn't trending early Monday morning as a result of a random communal appreciation of the somewhat overlooked entry in the auteurial duo's catalog. Instead, this increasingly tiresome existential trap known as Reality has birthed a troublingly Burn After Reading-esque story about one of the participants in the violent (and ultimately fatal) Capitol riot.
Now under investigation by the FBI is an allegation against a Pennsylvania woman identified as Riley June Williams involving a laptop owned by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. As detailed in this Daily Beast report Jamie Ross early Monday, Williams was recognized in Capitol attack footage by someone described as a former romantic partner, who then contacted the FBI.
Williams, per a criminal complaint, has been seen in footage "directing crowds" inside the Capitol building. At one point, the FBI said, she is seen telling others to head upstairs using a staircase that leads to Pelosi's office. According to the unidentified ex, Williams allegedly aimed to send a laptop or hard drive from Pelosi's office to "a friend in Russia." That friend, according to the ex, was then set to sell the device to Russia's foreign intelligence service. However, the deal is alleged to have collapsed.
Williams, whose alleged laptop-related actions remain under investigation, is already facing charges including entering a restricted building and disorderly conduct.
The Beast and other outlets have reported noted the existence of an outstanding warrant for Williams' arrest, noting that her whereabouts are currently unknown and all her socials have been deleted. While some claims were surfacing on Twitter early Monday that Williams had already been arrested, those claims have not been verified at the time of this writing.
Strap in, everyone. It's going to be a brutal fucking shitshow of a week.
