
Photo from federal case file.
WASHINGTON, D.C. (KFGO) – A federal grand jury has indicted a former Oriska, N.D. man who was arrested earlier this year on charges related to the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol.
62-year-old Rockne Earles is charged with assaulting, resisting, or impeding officers, and civil disorder, both felonies. He also faces six misdemeanor charges. He was first arrested in New Mexico in April.
Prosecutors say Earles grabbed and threw a Capitol police officer to the ground during the January 6 riots. He was identified from surveillance videos which showed that he was inside the Capitol for about 27 minutes. The FBI’s National Threat Operations Center learned of Earles’ participation in the attack by a series of anonymous tips.
Earles unsuccessfully ran for a seat on the Barnes County Commission in November of 2020. The next month he posted information regarding a bus traveling to Washington on January 6 on a Valley City community Facebook page.
The indictment was filed last week in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. Earles is set to be arraigned November 1.
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