Estimated read time: 4-5 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
SALT LAKE CITY — A Provo man who admitted to assaulting people with pepper spray at a 2020 Black Lives Matter protest in West Valley City will spend 14 days in jail and serve two years of probation.
Third District Judge Vernice Trease sentenced Randall Craig Schroerlucke, 46, in a hearing Thursday and told him he was fortunate to have an excellent lawyer representing him and a prosecutor who only recommended 14 days in jail. She also issued a longer jail sentence that is suspended as long as Schroerlucke completes his probation successfully.
Schroerlucke pleaded guilty to two counts of assault causing substantial bodily injury, a class A misdemeanor; and assault, a class B misdemeanor. If probation conditions are not met, he will spend 364 days in jail for the class A misdemeanors and 180 days in jail for the class B misdemeanor. The sentences will run concurrently.
Schroerlucke is the caregiver for his mother, who has memory problems, but Trease said she should not treat this case differently than other class A misdemeanor assaults because time in jail would be hard for his mother. Schroerlucke was handcuffed immediately after the hearing and taken into custody.
"These are serious charges and should be considered as such," Trease said.
The judge recognized that the crime occurred 2½ years before the sentencing and Schroerlucke has had no offenses since then and no prior offenses. However, Trease listed concerns about Schroerlucke's requests to keep weapons and said she is concerned he thought he was in the right because he turned over personal video of the incident to police despite no other weapons being seen in the video.
If someone was not intending to cause a commotion at a rally, Trease questioned why they would come with pepper spray, a stun gun and a gun. Although Schroerlucke has taken responsibility, she said he is still learning what he can and cannot do with weapons.
One injured, assault charges possible after 2020 confrontation between opposing protesters in West Valley
Police are investigating a confrontation at a protest that sent one man to the hospital after a brief clash between two groups outside the West Valley City Police Department Wednesday night.Schroerlucke went to a Black Lives Matter protest on Sept. 16, 2020, as part of a counterprotest. After someone asked him to cross on the opposite side of the street, he pulled out a stun gun and shocked the man, then pulled out pepper spray and sprayed it at the crowd.
Members of Black Lives Matter were protesting the fatal shooting of Damien Evans, 38, who was shot and killed as he fled from members of the U.S. Marshals Fugitive Apprehension Team in Salt Lake City. About 60 protesters and counterprotesters gathered outside the police department.
Three people from the crowd spoke at the hearing Thursday, including a woman whose face was pepper-sprayed by Schroerlucke, and another woman who said a gun was pointed at her face. One woman said she has gone to therapy as a result of the fear she felt that day.
"Looking down the barrel of a gun changes you," she said.
The woman who was hit with pepper spray said she had brought goggles and put them on her face before being sprayed; she said she was trying to keep him from harming others. She told Schroerlucke his actions affected many people.
"I want you to know that ... I have been here every step of the way because you deserve to pay for what you did," she said.
She said the person described by Schroerlucke's friends in the hearing — someone who cares for his neighbors and family — is completely different than the person she saw at the protest; that person, she said, was angry and felt comfortable pulling out weapons.
The woman continued, saying Schroerlucke disrupted a non-violent memorial that had children and dogs present, similar to many other protests and memorials she had gone to that year to hear the voices and experiences of Black Utahns.
"This was just the community trying to show up and support a family who has lost so much. ... We were all further traumatized," she said.
The woman said Schroerlucke used the stun gun on a man until his companion disarmed him, and then he pulled out pepper spray and continued to shove past her and others, emptying the pepper spray on the group as they formed a line to stop him from coming through. At that point, Schroerlucke pulled out a gun, she said.
Robert Cummings, Schroerlucke's attorney, said he was not suggesting the witnesses were lying, but pointed out that, in a video recording of the incident, it looks like Schroerlucke took out a gun briefly while he was pushed against a fence and put it back into his pocket without the barrel being pointed toward anyone — he noted the brandishing charge previously filed in the case had been dismissed.
Trease did not grant a request from Schroerlucke to allow him to keep one handgun and one long gun in his possession for self-defense. She said she does not take Second Amendment rights lightly, but she could not treat Schroerlucke differently than other defendants. She said she would consider allowing him to possess guns after he has had some treatment.
As a condition for probation, Schroerlucke was ordered to not have any weapons — including guns, pepper spray, stun guns and knives — have a mental health evaluation and complete recommendations from that evaluation, complete an anger management course, and have no contact with the victims or their families.
