Samuel Lazar biography: 13 things about US Capitol rioter from Ephrata, Pennsylvania

Samuel A. Lazar is an American man from Ephrata, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, United States. He is a self-described entrepreneur and one of his brothers is a military veteran.

Lazar has lived in different parts of New York, USA including Ridgewood and Maspeth and in different parts of Arizona, USA including Phoenix and Peoria. He previously lived in Cliffside Park, New Jersey, USA and in Fayetteville, North Carolina, USA.

Aside from Ephrata, Lazar has lived in other parts of Pennsylvania including Lansford, Highspire, Lititz, Harrisburg, Mechanicsburg, Lebanon and Dauphin. Here are 13 more things about him:

1. On November 25, 2020, he and Doug Mastriano, a Republican member of the Pennsylvania Senate from the 33rd district, were photographed together during the U.S. Senate hearing in Gettysburg. Mastriano later denied knowing who he was.
2. On January 6, 2021, he went to the U.S. Capitol building in Washington, D.C., USA wearing a camouflaged tactical vest, black hooded sweatshirt, blue jeans, protective goggles and camouflage face paint. He was accompanied by his sister. That day, Donald Trump supporters breached the building while a joint session of Congress was certifying the vote of the Electoral College and affirming Joe Biden‘s victory in the 2020 presidential election. During the riot, he was caught on camera pepper-spraying police and encouraging violence.
3. In April 2021, he was included in the Federal Bureau of Investigation‘s most wanted list.
4. On March 2, 2021, a tipster who claimed to have known him for 28 years pointed investigators to his Facebook page, where he chronicled his activities during the U.S. Capitol riot on January 6, 2021.
5. On June 5, 2021, he attended a Reopen Pennsylvania rally in Pittsburgh. Mastriano was photographed in proximity to him during the event.
6. On July 21, 2021, U.S. Magistrate Judge Zia M. Faruqui signed a criminal complaint filed against him by an FBI special agent filed a criminal complaint.
7. On July 26, 2021, he was arrested in Pennsylvania. For his participation in the U.S. Capitol riot on January 6, 2021, he was charged with assaulting, resisting or impeding certain officers, obstruction of law enforcement during civil disorder and knowingly entering or remaining in any restricted building or grounds without lawful authority and engaging in physical violence in a restricting building or grounds.
8. On July 27, 2021, he made his initial court appearance in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. He said he intended to dispute the charges related to the U.S. Capitol riot on January 6, 2021 and agreed to remain in custody until a hearing can be held in Washington, D.C. on whether he should be released pending trial.
9. On March 8, 2022, as part of a plea agreement, he waived indictment and pleaded guilty to assaulting, resisting or impeding certain officers as a felony and aiding and abetting.
10. On March 17, 2023, he was sentenced to 30 months incarceration as part of a sealed proceeding. He provided federal prosecutors with valuable information about other defendants accused of participating in the U.S. Capitol riot on January 6, 2021, agreed to testify in a murder trial and gave the government information about drugs and weapons smuggled into a federal detention facility. 
11. On July 18, 2023, he was released from prison to a halfway house.
12. On September 23, 2023, he was released from Bureau of Prison custody, having served his sentence.
13. He was 38 years old when U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson ordered on December 26, 2023 the unsealing of the court records about his prison release.

If you have information about someone who participated in the U.S. Capitol riot on January 6, 2021, call 1-800-CALL-FBI or submit relevant photos and videos to the FBI.