Capitol rioter dubbed ‘Doobie Smoker’ will remain in jail

NORFOLK, Va. — A California man, who was caught on video smoking marijuana inside the U.S. Capitol during the Jan. 6 siege, will remain in jail, a federal judge ruled Friday.

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Eduardo Nicolas Alvear Gonzalez, 32, of Ventura, nicknamed the “The Capitol Rotunda Doobie Smoker,” was arrested in an apartment in Virginia Beach, Virginia, on Tuesday, The Virginian-Pilot reported.

On Friday, Gonzalez was ordered by U.S. Magistrate Judge Lawrence Leonard to remain jailed and transferred to Washington, D.C., where his next hearing will be held on charges related to the riot at the Capitol, according to The Associated Press.

Gonzalez is charged with knowingly entering or remaining in a restricted building or grounds without lawful authority and engaging in disorderly or disruptive conduct, The Virginian-Pilot reported.

In several videos posted online after the Jan. 6 riot, a long-haired man with American flag pants is seen standing in the building’s rotunda with what appears to be a self-rolled cigarette in his hand, The Virginian-Pilot reported.

“It’s time to smoke weed in here,” the man yells in one of the recordings, according to Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew Bosse in a criminal complaint filed. After lighting the joint, the man hands out several others to fellow rioters, the complaint said.

In a YouTube video titled “The Capitol Rotunda Doobie Smoker explains why he did it,” Gonzalez responds “Freedom” when somebody on the video asked why he was smoking in the Capitol,

The day after the insurrection, Gonzales live-streamed a Zoom video, The Virginian-Pilot reported. Gonzalez described numerous photos and videos taken in the Capitol building and talked about going into the building to “take our country back,” the complaint said. Gonzalez also talked about how he and others walked around looking for “doors to break in,” according to the complaint.

According to the federal complaint, Gonzalez rented a place in Alexandria, Virginia, through Airbnb for the month of January and was scheduled to fly back to California on Feb. 1.

Bosse said Gonzalez frequently posts videos about conspiracy theories on YouTube, the AP reported.

“He has fallen under the sway of a web of conspiracy theories that is not just bizarre but dangerous,” Bosse told the court.

Some of Gonzalez’s videos have suggested that the Earth is flat, Bosse said. The prosecutor also alleged that Gonzalez also promotes the QAnon conspiracy theory, which asserts that Hollywood celebrities are operating a Satanic child sex trafficking cult.

“This is sheer wild-eyed nonsense,” Bosse told the court. “But if you believe that, what wouldn’t you do? The defendant was not just there sitting in his basement, absorbing this material. He’s acting on it, amplifying it and rebroadcasting it.”

Defense attorney Rodolfo Cejas told the court that it isn’t illegal to believe in conspiracy theories.

“It may be strange. It may be a variety of things. It’s not a crime,” Cejas said.

Leonard said Gonzalez’s beliefs did not factor into his decision to keep the defendant in custody.

“The court is not weighing whether or not someone who believes in QAnon poses a risk of danger to the community just based on those beliefs,” Leonard said. “The question for the court is whether or not those beliefs may tend to lead to action, action that could cause a risk of harm to the community.”

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