BUSTED

Jan. 6 Rioter Freed by Trump Arrested for Soliciting a Minor

Andrew Taake had been on the run for two weeks before he was detained on Thursday morning.

A Houston man recently pardoned by Donald Trump for his participation in the Jan. 6 Capitol riots has been arrested again on an outstanding child sex charge. Weeks after he was freed from federal prison—where he was serving time for attacking police officers with a metal whip and bear spray during the attack on the U.S. Capitol—Andrew Taake, 36, was detained on accusations that he sent sexually explicit messages to an undercover cop who was posing as 15-year-old girl in 2016. He was taken into custody on Thursday after being on the run for more than two weeks. Taake was turned in to the FBI months after the Capitol attack by a woman he met on dating app Bumble to whom he’d boasted about his participation in the riot. He was pardoned last month along with some 1,600 others who were charged in connection with the storming of the Capitol. Sean Teare, Harris County District Attorney, thanked authorities “for their diligence in getting this suspected child predator back into custody.”