North Texas real estate agent faces added charge in U.S. Capitol riot (2024)

A Tarrant County real estate agent who is accused of entering the U.S. Capitol during the Jan. 6 insurrection faces a new charge of participating in violence during the riot, according to court records.

Katherine Staveley Schwab “willfully and knowingly engaged in an act of physical violence” at the Capitol, according to court records filed last week.

Schwab, 33, previously had been charged with knowingly entering or remaining in any restricted building or grounds without lawful authority, and disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds.

The new charge was first reported by the Dallas Observer.

Schwab’s lawyer did not immediately respond to telephone and email requests for comment. A phone number listed in Schwab’s name was disconnected.

The charge is the newest in a mounting list of criminal complaints filed against Texans in connection with the riot that broke out as Congress worked to certify Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 presidential election.

Donald Trump falsely claimed victory, and in a speech that day he urged a crowd to march to the Capitol. According to a tally kept by George Washington University’s Program on Extremism, 45 Texans have faced federal charges related to the riot.

The FBI said Schwab had admitted to taking a private plane to Washington with four other people the day before the insurrection. On Jan. 6, Schwab and the group listened to speakers near the White House before they walked to the Capitol about 10:30 a.m.

FBI agents said Schwab told them that nothing was happening at the Capitol, so some members of the group decided to leave for the hotel, according to court records. There, Schwab saw on the news that the Capitol had been breached, court records show. Schwab told authorities they decided to take an Uber back to the Capitol.

She told the FBI she noticed there were some “bad apples” in the crowd.

“Though Schwab did not see any violence or anyone destroying anything, she observed the door to the Capitol building had been destroyed,” an FBI agent wrote in Schwab’s criminal complaint. “Schwab said she was pushed by the crowds through the original set of doors entering the building and into a lobby area.”

Schwab said she felt crushed by the crowds. A Capitol police officer pointed her to an exit, according to the complaint.

Schwab was eventually arrested with two other members of the group that had taken the plane to Washington — Jennifer Ryan and Jason Hyland.

The newly filed court records do not detail what violence Schwab is accused of participating in. But a lawyer for Ryan, Guy Womack, said the government contacted him about the new charge Schwab was facing and told him that the same charge does not apply to Ryan.

“They’re alleging that Ms. Schwab did something violent,” Womack said. “I think they’re accusing her of kicking a camera. It doesn’t sound like a very violent act, the little bit that they told me.”

Womack said that though there were violent people in the crowd who broke windows, breached the office of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and clashed with police, Ryan and Schwab only walked into the Capitol.

“Hundreds of the defendants in this case should not be given a jail sentence for walking in the Capitol,” he said. “People at the very front pushed their way through and some broke windows. Those are criminal acts — you can’t be breaking a window at the U.S. Capitol. ... But the overwhelming majority of the people didn’t go to any private area at all.”

Womack said Ryan was “just there as an interested American citizen who wanted to see what the procedure was.”

The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, which keeps a database of incidents involving violence against journalists, reported several instances of violence against the news media during the riot. Outside the Capitol, rioters rushed TV crews and destroyed their equipment.

The day after the riot, the real estate office where Schwab worked said she was “no longer associated” with the company.

Five people died during or shortly after the insurrection, including Ashli Babbitt, who was shot by law enforcement as she tried to enter a restricted area.

In a Facebook post, Schwab referred to that shooting, according to her criminal complaint.

“After the girl was shot and killed,” she wrote, “that’s when we raised hell.”

Correction:An earlier version of this article misspelled the name of the woman who was fatally shot during the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol. Her name was Ashli Babbitt.