An Illinois man charged with firing a gun at the January 6 insurrection is "mind-numbingly dangerous" and must be held in detention ahead of trial, federal prosecutors warned in a new filing.
John Banuelos was charged last Friday, two years after an NBC News investigation into his identity. While many January 6 defendants were charged with using dangerous weapons against police, and some were accused of bringing firearms to D.C., Banuelos is the first to be accused of actually firing a gun during the riot itself.
In 2022, Banuelos, who lived in Utah at the time, was arrested for his involvement in an unrelated fatal stabbing. While he was ultimately not charged in that case due to a claim of self-defense, he volunteered to Salt Lake City detectives that he thought the FBI might be coming for him because he was involved in January 6.
At the time, NBC News identified him as a man in the January 6 crowd with a gun tucked into his waistband. But a month ago, convicted rioter Derrick Evans, who is now running for Congress in West Virginia, published video that appeared to show Banuelos firing a gun twice.
The FBI began tracking his phone after that footage was made public.
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In the filing, obtained by NBC's Ryan Reilly, prosecutors highlighted just how much of a threat they believe Banuelos to be.
"As the mob overran officers, Banuelos climbed the scaffolding into view of other rioters, removed the firearm from his waistband, and fired two shots into the air," said the filing.
"This conduct is mind-numbingly dangerous. Any number of life-threatening events could have transpired, e.g., the threat of an active shooter at the Capitol on January 6 could have triggered a lethal response from law enforcement or a stampede of other rioters.
"Fortunately, none of these events came to pass, but the fact that no such harm ensued does nothing to mitigate the seriousness of Banuelos’s actions."
