A former government employee is accused of falsely implicating multiple colleagues as participants on the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Michael Zapata was arrested Thursday in Virginia after the FBI traced back IP addresses allegedly connecting him to at least seven reports identifying government employees and contractors as participants in unlawful activities when Congress certified President Joe Biden’s electoral win in the 2020 election.
Zapata claimed some of those individuals openly shared anti-government conspiracy theories and participated in the storming of the Capitol. He also wrote to the FBI tip site that one alleged ne’er-do-well intended to “hunt for politicians and execute them.”
However, none of the people Zapata accused were in Washington D.C. or involved in the lethal siege intended to disrupt Biden’s certification as the nation’s 46th president.
When would-be whistleblowers log in to the FBI’s tip site, they must agree to a terms of use statement that reads, “I understand that providing false information could subject me to fine, imprisonment, or both.”
Federal investigators said the similar wording in Zapata’s alleged tips, the grouping of the dates they were submitted, and “the technical tradecraft used to submit them” indicated the bad information was being generated by the same person.
The suspect sent several false tips in February and another in April, according to a criminal complaint filed in a federal court on Wednesday. Zapata allegedly forwarded information about the people he hoped to frame, sometimes including their names, ages, employment history and nicknames.
Zapata is due in court May 23 for a preliminary hearing, according to Washington D.C. station WUSA 9. He previously worked with at least seven people he targeted. It’s not clear why he chose those former colleagues
