Reffitt’s 19-year-old son, Jackson, testified last Thursday that his father threatened him and his sister, then 16, after he drove home from Washington. Reffitt told his children they would be traitors if they reported him to authorities and said “traitors get shot,” Jackson Reffitt recalled.
He said the threat terrified him. His younger sister, Peyton, was listed as a possible government witness but didn’t testify. She said that she would talk more later on her own time, but: “Kids should never be used against the parents.”
Jackson Reffitt used a cellphone app to secretly record his father boasting about his role in the riot. Jurors heard excerpts of that family conversation.
Jackson Reffitt initially contacted the FBI on Christmas Eve, less than two weeks before the riot, to report concerns about his father’s behavior and increasingly worrisome rhetoric. But the FBI didn’t respond until Jan. 6, after the riot erupted.