Gunman in ‘Pizzagate’ Shooting Is Sentenced to 4 Years in Prison
By MATTHEW HAAG and MAYA SALAMJUNE 22, 2017
A 29-year-old North Carolina man who fired a military-style assault rifle inside a popular Washington pizzeria in December,
wrongly believing he was saving children trapped in a sex-slave ring, was sentenced on Thursday to four years in prison.
He was investigating unfounded but widespread online reports of children held there in a child abuse scheme led by Hillary Clinton, a theory known as “Pizzagate.”
But Mr. Welch, who pleaded guilty to federal weapons charges in March, rescued no children.
The judge, Ketanji Brown Jackson of Federal District Court in Washington, sentenced Mr. Welch to four years in prison and three years of probation.
The owner of Comet Ping Pong, James Alefantis, said in a phone interview on Thursday evening
that he was relieved the case was over but said that his name had been tainted by the conspiracies