Oath Keepers lawyer pleads guilty to ordering militia to destroy evidence after Capitol riot

WASHINGTON — A Texas woman who served as the former general counsel for the Oath Keepers pleaded guilty Wednesday to telling militia members to destroy potentially incriminating messages after the Capitol riot.

Kellye Sorelle, 43, of Junction, appeared before U.S. District Judge Amit P. Mehta on Wednesday to enter her plea of guilty to one felony count of obstruction of justice and one misdemeanor count of entering and remaining in a restricted grounds.

SoRelle, an attorney and former Republican candidate for the Texas House of Representatives, was one of approximately two dozen people with links to the Oath Keepers militia charged as part of the government’s largest Capitol riot case to date. She previously served as general counsel for the Oath Keepers, as well as counsel for Latinos for Trump. SoRelle was with Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes on Capitol grounds on Jan. 6 but did not enter the building.

At the trial of Rhodes and other members of the militia in late 2022, prosecutors said SoRelle passed messages from Rhodes to the rest of the group telling them to “GET BUSY” deleting comments on their chats that could incriminate them or others.

In court Wednesday, SoRelle admitted she allowed Rhodes to use her phone to send messages to the militia and also sent messages on his behalf, including one reading, "Per SR, clean up all your chats."

"You understood when you sent that it was a direction to delete evidence?" Mehta asked.

"Yes," SoRelle said.

SoRelle had been scheduled to go to trial herself last year with two other defendants, Donovan Crowl and James Beeks, but her appearance was derailed after separate evaluators hired by both her attorney and federal prosecutors determined she was not competent to stand trial. Last June, U.S. District Judge Amit P. Mehta ordered SoRelle, who had been on pretrial release until that point, into the custody of the Bureau of Prisons for competency restoration. The BOP informed the court SoRelle had been returned to competency in February, and U.S. District Judge Amit P. Mehta formally entered a finding that she’d been restored in July.

Prior to her plea, SoRelle had been scheduled to begin trial in November. She's now scheduled to be sentenced on Jan. 17 at 10 a.m.

Rhodes was convicted of seditious conspiracy and other charges for plotting to forcibly oppose the lawful transfer of power after the 2020 election and sentenced in May 2023 to 18 years in prison. According to the BOP, his expected release date was Jan. 28, 2037.