President Donald Trump’s historic Jan. 20 pardons of the U.S. Capitol rioters freed prisoners and ended the legal cases of nearly 1,600 people, shutting down the largest federal prosecution in U.S. history.
But one case with a connection to the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the Capitol remains, and the Texas woman involved still faces the prospect of prison time.
Brazoria County jail
A federal judge in Texas has scheduled sentencing for Abigail Shry, 44, for May 5 at the federal courthouse in Houston. Shry pleaded guilty in November to a threat charge — for making a vulgar, racist and violent threat in 2023 against the judge handling Mr. Trump’s Jan. 6 criminal case in Washington.
Prosecutors alleged Shry made the threatening phone call to U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan just hours after Chutkan was assigned to handle Trump’s election subversion criminal case.
They argued Shry called Chutkan’s chambers from Shry’s hometown of Alvin, Texas, and left the threat on the judge’s chambers voicemail service. According to the Justice Department, Shry’s voicemail message “threatened to kill anyone who went after former President Trump.” The charging documents in Shry’s case allege she referred to Chutkan as a “slave (epithet)” in the message.
Prosecutors said Shry also left a message for a member of Congress in which she said, “If President Trump doesn’t get elected in 2024, we are coming to kill you, so tread lightly.”
According to the Justice Department, “On Aug. 8, 2023, authorities went to (Shry’s) residence, at which time she admitted the phone number associated with the calls was hers and that she did in fact make the call to the judge’s chambers. She noted that she had no plans to travel anywhere to carry out anything she stated. However, she told authorities that if the congresswoman ever traveled to her city, then “we need to worry.”
While being questioned by federal agents in her case, Shry continued to rant against Democrats and “explained her hate for the government,” according to testimony at a May 2024 hearing in her case.
Chutkan was frequently seen with protective details in Washington in the months after she was assigned Trump’s Jan. 6 criminal case, which was dismissed by special counsel Jack Smith after the 2024 election.
Prosecutors, witnesses and judges who were part of Jan. 6 criminal cases were subjected to frequent harassment, menacing and threats, according to testimony and statements made during criminal proceedings in the riot cases. Some judges noted the frequency of violent threats targeting judges during the Jan. 6 sentencing hearings.
Shry’s sentencing has been postponed multiple times, but carries the prospect of a prison term. Her attorney declined CBS News request for comment, including what sentence Shry will seek at the hearing.
At a detention hearing in Shry’s case last year, a defense attorney suggested the court order her to undergo mental health and substance abuse treatment. A Justice Department prosecutor argued she could be at risk of making future threats. The prosecutor told the judge in May 2024, “Judge, my greatest concern in this case is that she starts watching Fox News again, gets herself spun up, she goes out, she gets a case of beer, continues to get herself spun up. There’s no way to gauge what’s going to happen here, except to look at what she’s done in the past six months. I mean, not even a year, the past six months.”
Threats against federal officials have surged in the years since Jan. 6, 2021. U.S. Capitol Police records show the number of threat investigations undertaken by the department has jumped from 6,955 cases in 2019 to 9,474 cases in 2024.
Agency reports show threat investigations by the U.S. Marshals Service, which provides security to federal judges and prosecutors, nearly tripled from 2019 to 2023.
