Aug 24, 2022 3 min read

A former Fayette County woman accused of using pepper spray on police officers alongside her husband during the riot at the U.S. Capitol last year is planning to plead guilty this morning in federal court.

Shelly Stallings is scheduled for a hearing in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., in which she is expected to plead guilty to all charges for her role in the Jan. 6 attack on Congress, although she’ll likely be sentenced at a later date.

Stallings and her husband, Peter Schwartz, are originally from Kentucky, but were living in Uniontown when federal investigators said they traveled to Washington, D.C., for a rally in support of former president Donald Trump before marching to the Capitol. Court documents indicated that Schwartz and another co-defendant, Jeffrey Brown, handed Stallings a canister of pepper spray and she “briefly sprayed” Capitol and DC Metro police officers guarding the building.

“At no time did any of these officers attempt to assault the defendant and the defendant did not spray the officers in self-defense,” according to a mutual statement of fact submitted to the court by both sides Friday.

The open plea means U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta will have discretion on whether to accept or reject it, while also deciding at a later date her sentence without preconditions from either side. The sentencing range for the charges means she could face 46 to 57 months in federal prison for her role in the riot.

Stallings notified the court Aug. 5 that she intended to plead guilty and both sides filed a joint statement of fact Friday ahead of this morning’s plea hearing, according to online case filings. She has been free on $25,000 unsecured bond since being indicted by a federal grand jury Feb. 9. Her federal public defender, Scott Wendelsdor, declined to comment Tuesday when reached by telephone at his office in Kentucky.

The plea hearing for Stallings will be held at 10:30 a.m. through video conferencing, and she will attend virtually from her home in Kentucky. The charges that Stallings is expected to plead guilty to are civil disorder; resisting, imposing, intimidating or impeding certain officers; unlawfully entering and remaining on Capitol property with a dangerous weapon; disorderly and disruptive conduct on restricted grounds; engaging in physical violence; disorderly conduct; and acts of physical violence on Capitol grounds. She will likely remain free on bond while awaiting sentencing.

Meanwhile, the charges against Schwartz are more serious and he’s made it clear from previous status hearings that he intends to contest them at trial.

Schwartz, who is a convicted felon and was released from a Kentucky prison in 2020 because of COVID-19 safety protocols, was living in this area with Stallings while working as a traveling welder. Schwartz has been jailed since his arrest at their Uniontown apartment in February 2021, while Stallings eventually returned to her hometown near Owensboro, Ky.

The couple is now estranged, and it is unknown whether Stallings will be asked to testify during Schwartz’s trial that is currently scheduled for early November.

Schwartz is accused of dousing police officers with pepper spray and wielding a wooden tire thumper while trying unsuccessfully to get into the Capitol. After Schwartz’s arrest, Stallings told investigators “she saw him mace the police,” according to testimony at his preliminary hearing early last year. Federal investigators said video from the riot shows Schwartz spraying officers, and they also claimed to have text messages he sent to an acquaintance in which he allegedly admitted to participating in the riot.