Shutterstock / lev radin
Police battle with supporters of Donald Trump as they try to enter the front doors of the U.S. Capitol on January 6.
The FBI last week took Trina Reyes — Von Ormy’s mayor from 2015 to 2017 — into custody on a federal warrant, according to the daily. The paper reports that Fredericksburg real estate agent Sally Ann Milavec and Leslie Bogue, a friend of Reyes from Oklahoma, also were arrested by federal agents.
All three face charges of entering a restricted building, disorderly conduct in a restricted building, disruptive conduct in the Capitol and illegally parading or demonstrating inside the Capitol, the Express-News reports. They were released without paying bail and ordered to appear in the Washington, D.C., federal court where the charges are filed.
On Jan. 6, 2021, supporters of outgoing President Donald Trump, many of them heavily armed, stormed the U.S. Capitol in a bid to overturn the election. At least seven people died in connection with the attack, and 140 police officers were assaulted.
During interviews with federal authorities, Reyes said a police officer opened a door at the Capitol during the breach to let her in, according to the Express-News. She confirmed that she took photos while inside but after witnessing vandalism by others, she "immediately walked back out of the U.S. Capitol,” according an affidavit cited in the article.
Reyes oversaw Von Ormy during a time when chaos erupted over the town's inability to deliver basic services including offering police protection and animal control, according to the Texas Observer.
The town of roughly 1,300 residents incorporated in 2008 to stave off annexation by San Antonio and declared itself a Tea Party-approved “liberty city,” the Observer reports. However, the municipality's experiment with libertarian governance resulted in its police department losing accreditation after failing to meet basic standards and the collapse of its underfunded volunteer fire department.
During that time, three members of the Von Ormy City Council also were arrested for alleged violations of the Open Meetings Act, according to the Observer's reporting.
More than 1,350 people have been charged in connection with the Jan. 6 attack, according to a recent NBC News review of federal data. Prosecutors have won roughly 950 convictions in those cases for crimes ranging from trespassing to felonies, including seditious conspiracy.
At least 85 of those charged over the attack were arrested in Texas, according to Justice Department data.
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