Two neo-Nazi group members whose talk of planning an attack at a Virginia gun rights rally was secretly recorded by the FBI pleaded guilty on Thursday to gun charges.
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Former Canadian Armed Forces reservist Patrik Jordan Mathews, US Army veteran Brian Mark Lemley Jr. and a third member of The Base were arrested on federal charges in Maryland ahead of the January 2020 rally at Virginia's Capitol in Richmond.
Mathews, 28, and Lemley, 35, pleaded guilty at separate hearings to charges including illegally transporting a firearm and obstruction of justice – theydestroyed cellphones when FBI agents raided their apartment.
The third co-defendant, William Garfield Bilbrough IV, was sentenced to five years in prison after pleading guilty in December to helping Mathews illegally enter the US from Canada in 2019.
None of the defendants faced terrorism-related charges, and a "stipulation of facts" signed by Mathews, Lemley and prosecutors didn't mention the Richmond rally. But prosecutors are reserving the right to seek a so-called terrorism enhancement at sentencing that could lead to a significant increase in a prison term if the judge agrees to apply it.
