WASHINGTON (AP) — A Massachusetts doctor who punched a police officer during a mob attack on the U.S. Capitol was sentenced Thursday to nine months in prison, followed by nine months of home confinement.
Jacquelyn Starer was among a crowd of rioters at the Capitol on January 6, 2021, when she punched the officer and shouted a profane insult.
Starer told U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly that she is not proud of her actions that day, including her “regrettable encounter” with the officer.
“I accept full responsibility for my actions that day, and I truly wish my mind had won out over my emotions,” she said.
Starer also turned around to apologize to the officer she assaulted. The officer, identified only by her initials in court documents, told the judge she feared for her life as she and other officers fought for hours to defend the Capitol from the mob of Donald Trump supporters.
“Are you really going to take responsibility for your actions or are you just going to say, 'It wasn't my fault. Fight or flight?'” the officer asked Starer before she spoke in court.
Starer, 70, of Ashland, Massachusetts, pleaded guilty in April to eight charges, including one count of assault, without reaching a plea agreement with prosecutors.
Prosecutors recommended a sentence of two years and three months for Starer, a doctor who primarily practiced addiction medicine before her arrest. Starer's attorneys asked the judge to sentence her to house arrest instead of prison time.
Online licensing records indicate that Starer agreed in January 2023 not to practice medicine in Massachusetts. The state granted her a medical license in 1983.
Starer attended then-President Trump’s “Stop the Steal” rally at the White House on January 6 before joining the crowd outside the Capitol. She entered the building through the Rotunda doors about 15 minutes after they were breached.
In the Rotunda, Starer and other rioters tried to push past police officers guarding a doorway to the office of then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Starer pushed through other rioters to get to the front of the police line, where she shouted at officers.
When another rioter tried to stop her, Starer grabbed the person’s arm, pushed him down, and then pushed him into the police line. When one of the officers pushed Starer back, she turned and punched the officer. The attack was captured on police body camera video.
“Riotists responded to the attack by becoming more aggressive and subsequently attacking police,” a prosecutor wrote.
Starer's attorneys said she became angry at the rioter who tried to restrain her. She instinctively hit the officer's arm in response to the shoving, her attorneys said. They argued that Starer was reacting to the shoving and was not motivated by the officer's professional status.
“Dr. Starer deeply regrets this entire interaction and fully recognizes that it constituted criminal conduct on her part,” her attorneys wrote.
The judge said Starer ran toward the police line “like a heat-seeking projectile.”
“That's quite an ominous thing, given the threat to the physical safety of our members of Congress,” Kelly said.
The judge asked Starer where she wanted to go.
“The short answer is, 'I don't know,'” she replied.
Starer appeared to be suffering from the effects of pepper spray when she left the Capitol, about 15 minutes after entering the building.
“She was assisted by other rioters, including one rioter dressed in camouflage clothing and wearing a helmet with a military emblem with the word ‘MILITIA,’” the prosecutor wrote.
According to Starer's lawyers, she realizes that she has probably already treated her last patient.
“Her inability to do the work she loves has left a huge hole in her life that she is struggling to fill,” they wrote.
Nearly 1,500 people have been charged with federal crimes related to the Capitol Hill riots. More than 900 have been convicted and sentenced, with about two-thirds receiving prison sentences ranging from a few days to 22 years.
