FBI Director Christopher Wray told the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday that he cannot release Capitol Hill policeman Brian Sicknick’s cause of death.
The agency’s investigation, Wray said, is unfinished, although he strongly suggested that the agency knows why the officer died after the melee at the U.S. Capitol on January 6.
As The New American reported weeks ago, a family member told ProPublica that Sicknick died after a stroke, and had contacted family the night of the riot to say he was fine. He died the next day.
Confirming that a stroke killed the officer is important because it would destroy, once and for all, the false leftist media narrative — used in the second impeachment of President Trump — that a Trump supporter killed Sicknick with a fire extinguisher, and that Trump was an accomplice.
Grassley and Cruz
Wray refused to disclose the facts about Sicknick in answering a question from GOP Senator Charles Grassley of Iowa.
“We all want to know what happened to Officer Brian Sicknick, the tragic death as a result of that January 6th assault,” Grassley said. “There’s been conflicting reports about his cause of death. Have you determined the exact cause of death and is there a homicide investigation?”
There is an ongoing investigation into his death. I have to be careful at this stage because it’s ongoing not to get out in front of it. But I certainly understand and respect and appreciate the keen interest in what happened to him. After all, he was here protecting all of you. And as soon [as we have] information that we can appropriately share, we want to be able to do that. But at the moment, the investigation is still ongoing.
That answer invited a more specific question from the Iowan: “So does that mean since the investigation’s going on, you have not determined the exact cause of the death?
No, Wray replied, “that means we can’t yet disclose a cause of death at this stage.”
“But you have determined the cause of death?” Grassley persisted.
Answered Wray:
I didn’t say that. We’re not at a point where we can disclose or confirm the cause of death.
Is it possible, two months after the riot, that the FBI does not know what killed Sicknick: a stroke, or blunt-force trauma from a fire extinguisher?
Whatever his answer, when pressed by Cruz, who asked whether the FBI has “any information” it can share about Sicknick, Wray remained firm:
Although I certainly understand and appreciate the keen interest in it for all the reasons we’ve discussed, at the moment, other than to say the Capitol Police has of course categorized it, I think appropriately as a line of duty death, there’s nothing really that I can share right now. Certainly, I understand why it’s very much top of mind for people. And I think it speaks well of the members of Congress that they’re so interested in somebody who’s lost his life protecting all of you. So as soon as we’re in a position when the investigation has gotten to a stage where we can share information, we want to be able to do that.
Given that police routinely publicize the cause of death of murder victims, Wray’s excuse that he cannot release the cause of Sicknick’s death sounds fishy.
That aside, the FBI obviously knows what killed Sicknick. It simply won’t say…
What Killed Sicknick
Clearly, the FBI knows what killed Sicknick. It simply won’t say. It was not a fire extinguisher hurled by a Trump supporter.
In the hours after the riot, which ruined a peaceful pro-Trump march, Sicknick texted his brother, ProPublica reported. “He texted me last night and said, ‘I got pepper-sprayed twice,’ and he was in good shape,” Sicknick’s brother, Ken, told the website:
But the day after that text exchange, the family got word that Brian Sicknick had a blood clot and had had a stroke; a ventilator was keeping him alive.
“We weren’t expecting it,” his brother said.
ProPublica divulged that information on January 8, the same day the New York Times reported that Sicknick was “was killed by a Pro-Trump mob,” as the headline said. The weapon: A fire extinguisher.
The Times retracted that falsehood, but not before it showed up in the memorandum that House Democrats used in their bogus impeachment case that Trump “incited” an “insurrection.”
“The insurrectionists killed a Capitol Police officer by striking him in the head with a fire extinguisher,” the Democrats falsely claimed.
The memo is dated February 2, the same day CNN reported that FBI officials didn’t know why Sicknick died.
