Ryan Nichols

Public January 6 profile · ready to claim

Joseph Eric Bierbrodt

January 6 defendant

Joseph Eric Bierbrodt profile photograph from NPR's January 6 archiveDocumented editorial-use image
NPR's The Capitol Charges; database photo credit: Department of Justice (all named credit exceptions excluded) Published for archive identification and reporting; reuse rights are not represented as cleared.Image source →

Joseph Eric Bierbrodt wore the uniform of the Illinois National Guard. He is a Peru, Illinois native who put on a Guard uniform for his state and his country before he was ever a name in a federal docket. Start there. Because every outlet that covered him started somewhere else. The National Guard is the neighbor who shows up when the river comes over the bank. Floods. Storms. Deployments. Illinois asked and Joseph Bierbrodt answered, for years, until he retired out of it. WHAT THE RECORD SHOWS FACT: He is a former and retired member of the Illinois National Guard, reported by the Chicago Sun-Times, ABC7 Chicago, FOX 32 Chicago, and CBS Chicago. FACT: He is a Peru, Illinois native, per WLPO and Starved Rock Media. FACT: A criminal complaint was filed July 24, 2023 and he was arrested July 26, 2023, per the DOJ record. FACT: He was charged alongside his brother, per ABC7 Chicago and the Daily Beast. FACT: He pleaded guilty in late October 2024, per the Chicago Sun-Times, ABC7 Chicago, Patch, and a Justice Department release. FACT: On January 20, 2025, President Trump granted clemency covering the January 6 prosecutions. The Chicago Sun-Times listed Illinois residents covered by it. CHARGE ONLY: The government alleged assault on law enforcement. He entered a plea. Read the counts as counts, and the plea as the plea, and nothing more. THE LEGAL FIGHT Charged in the summer of 2023, two and a half years after January 6, 2021. Plea in October 2024. Clemency in January 2025. Joseph Eric Bierbrodt spent roughly eighteen months as a public federal defendant in his own hometown, in a part of Illinois where everybody knows everybody. WHAT THIS DOES NOT PROVE: Nothing in this profile establishes any fact beyond the charges filed and the plea accepted. WHAT IT DOES PROVE: Before any of this, Joseph Eric Bierbrodt of Peru, Illinois raised his hand and served in the Illinois National Guard. That is on the record too, and it does not get erased by a docket number. THE CASE RECORD Case 23mj00180, U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. Complaint filed 07/24/2023. Arrested 07/26/2023. DOJ page: https://www.justice.gov/usao-dc/defendants/bierbrod-joseph-3 This profile is unclaimed. If this is you, or your family, claiming it is free, forever.

The case file

On the record

Case number
23mj00180
Court
U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia
Disposition
Complaint Filed - 07/24/ 2023 Arrested - 07/26/2023
Arrested
July 26, 2023

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Connection to United States v. Nichols

Joseph Eric Bierbrodt appears in the record of United States v. Nichols. The full case — timeline, people, documents — is public and free.

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