Record at a Glance
- Category
- Jan 6th
- Age in NPR record
- 21
- Location
- Middlesex, North Carolina
- Charges
- Civil Disorder; Assaulting, Resisting, or Impeding Certain Officers Using a Dangerous Weapon; Assaulting, Resisting or Impeding Certain Officers; Entering and Remaining in a Restricted Building or Grounds with a Deadly or Dangerous Weapon; Disorderly and Disruptive Conduct in a Restricted Building or Grounds; Engaging in Physical Violence in a Restricted Building or Grounds; Disorderly Conduct in a Capitol Building; Act of Physical Violence in the Capitol Grounds or Buildings; Parading, Demonstrating, or Picketing in a Capitol Building
- Case status
- Pleaded guilty; Dismissed in part or full; Sentenced
- Presidential action
- Pardon
Case Summary
When Matthew Jason Beddingfield allegedly stormed the U.S. Capitol, he was in the midst of legal proceedings on an attempted murder charge. He later pled guilty to a lesser charge. Prosecutors investigating the Capitol insurrection say online sleuths referred to Beddingfield as #soggykidinsider and #nazigrayhat because he appeared wet in some photographs and could apparently be seen performing a Nazi salute. Court documents say private citizens used facial recognition software to connect images of Beddingfield on Jan. 6, 2021, to his mugshot from the attempted murder case. Beddingfield was also the subject of a HuffPost article on the use of facial recognition software by citizen sleuths. The FBI says that while Beddingfield’s father told HuffPost his son was not at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, and had never been there before, public Facebook posts show Beddingfield and his father at the Capitol in November of 2020. The bureau also alleges that Beddingfield’s father wrote in a Facebook post: “WE ARE HERE TO TAKE THIS COUNTRY BACK FROM THOSE COMMIE BASTARDS” and confirmed to a commenter that he was in Washington, D.C. According to court documents, surveillance footage from the Capitol shows Beddingfield jumping a barricade on Capitol grounds and jabbing at law enforcement officers with a flagpole he carried. Prosecutors also allege that after Beddingfield entered the Capitol, he tried to strike police officers with the flagpole.
Case History
Beddingfield pleaded Guilty to one charge: Assaulting, Resisting, or Impeding Certain Officers. The other charges are dismissed. Sentenced on 7/11/2023 to 38 Months Incarceration; supervised Release of 24 Months; Special Assessment Of $100; Restitution of $2000. Beddingfield received a full pardon on January 20, 2025
Sources
- Primary Documentation
NPR Jan. 6 Defendant DatabaseNPR - Primary Documentation
Underlying court recordCourt record linked by NPR
Case summary, charges, procedural updates and image are drawn from the NPR Jan. 6 archive snapshot dated 2026-09-25 unless otherwise indicated.