A Texas senior citizen seen on video assaulting a local newscaster during the Jan. 6 Capitol riot was finally identified by the FBI thanks to three neighbors, a local defense attorney, and a “distinctive” cellphone case portraying—utterly absurdly—a chiseled Donald Trump as an in-his-prime Rocky Balboa.
That’s according to a federal complaint unsealed Thursday, following Dana Jean Bell’s arrest earlier in the day by FBI agents in the Dallas suburb of Princeton. Bell, 65, also attacked a second member of the news media who tried to intervene, and actively resisted police officers while calling one of them a “fucking pussy traitor,” the complaint alleges.
Bell is now facing two felony counts stemming from her alleged participation in the failed insurrection: assaulting, resisting, or impeding certain officers and obstruction of law enforcement during a civil disorder, plus a slew of misdemeanors, including knowingly entering or remaining in any restricted building or grounds without lawful authority; disorderly and disruptive conduct in a restricted building or grounds; disorderly conduct in the Capitol grounds or buildings; and parading, demonstrating, or picketing in a Capitol building.
Bell was among the many pro-Trump insurrectionists captured in footage shot during the sacking of the Capitol, the complaint states, mentioning specifically her gray knit hat, purple backpack, and “cell phone with a folio-style cover that was rose in color and consisted of an American flag backdrop and images of former President Donald Trump (one shirtless posing as the character Rocky Balboa from the movie Rocky).”
Prior to entering the Capitol building that day, Bell was part of “an angry group of rioters yelling at members of the media, calling them ‘traitors’ and ‘fake news,’ and telling them to ‘get out,’” according to the complaint. “They use expletives and ‘flip off’ the camera crew.”
The complaint says Bell became increasingly aggressive towards the crew, and started grabbing and pushing at “a local news anchor from Fox 5”—newswoman Sierra Fox—who recorded the harrowing incident on her cell phone and later posted it to Twitter.
“Notably, Bell’s distinctive telephone case can be observed in video footage capturing the assault, including in some of the still shots from that footage, depicted below,” the complaint goes on. (In 2016, a polite but skeptical Stallone told Variety, “I love Donald Trump. He’s a great Dickensian character. You know what I mean? There are certain people like Arnold, Babe Ruth, that are bigger than life. But I don’t know how that translates to running the world.”)
When another journalist stepped in to help Fox, the complaint says Bell “began violently engaging with him, too… appearing to aggressively kick the posterior area of the male.”
“The video then shows Bell again turning her attention to the news anchor,” the complaint states. “Again, Bell appears to engage the female and kick her in the front lower legs.”
Bell then made her way inside the Capitol, where, according to the complaint, she interfered with police attempting to render aid to rioter Ashli Babbitt, who had been shot by an officer as she tried to climb into the Speaker’s Lobby through a barricaded door. Instead of making way, the complaint says Bell “aggressively yell[ed] toward various officers, showing them her middle finger.”
In bodycam footage, Bell at one point can be seen “call[ing] an MPD officer a ‘fucking pussy traitor,’ ‘pussy traitor,’ and a ‘c-nt,’” according to the complaint.
“Bell is also heard telling officers, ‘Do not touch me,’ while appearing to actively resist and/or push back against officers as she is being forced to exit the Capitol,” it says, noting that Bell grabbed at one of the cops’ batons. “She is also heard telling an MPD officer, ‘y’all suck,’ while flipping her middle finger in the officer’s face.”
Bell finally left the building shortly before 3 p.m., after roughly 30 minutes inside, according to the complaint.
On April 4, 2021, the FBI circulated images of Bell to the news media in an attempt to identify her. A year later, she still hadn’t been caught, and the bureau tried again.
This time, at least three separate people “who knew Bell personally and who lived in the same neighborhood in Texas identified [her] as the woman shown in the BOLO #318,” the complaint states. “… In addition, after the BOLO was made public, the FBI was contacted by a Dallas defense attorney on or about April 5, 2022, who advised that BOLO #318 was Bell.”
Bell does not yet have a lawyer listed in court records, and was unable to be reached for comment on Thursday. She is one of more than 1,230 people who have been charged with breaching the Capitol, and one of more than 440 charged with assaulting or impeding law enforcement, according to the Department of Justice.
Fox did not respond to The Daily Beast’s request for comment on Bell’s arrest.
