Standing on the ledge of a damaged window subsequent to a Beverly Hills esthetician with mascara working from the tear gasoline, a bearded man with wild blue eyes made an attraction to the group surrounding the U.S. Capitol. “Final probability, who desires to make historical past with me? Who’s a person? Who’s a patriot? I’m going into Capitol Hill on my own — who desires to man the fuck up? Patriots, let’s do that proper fucking now!” he shouted right into a megaphone.
Returning the bullhorn to the esthetician, he entered the Capitol by the damaged window. Inside, in an upturned convention room, he led a bunch of rioters out of the room and into an adjoining hallway, the place he kicked the door of one other convention room a number of occasions to assist open it. He and a number of other others rifled by papers and ransacked the room, earlier than leaving the Capitol with a memento gasoline masks.
The bearded man now stands charged of conspiracy, obstruction of an official continuing and aiding and abetting, tampering with paperwork or proceedings, obstruction of legislation enforcement throughout civil dysfunction, theft of presidency property, destruction of presidency property, and getting into a restricted constructing. His whereabouts are at the moment unknown. The Division of Justice declined to remark.
But it wasn’t his Duck Dynasty-esque facial hair or his center-stage function that captured worldwide consideration within the weeks after the tried rebel. As an alternative, it was the unassuming pink scarf he wore that day — by any measure, a sensible wardrobe determination for D.C. winters. However to some eagle-eyed Swedes, the headband had particular that means.
The neckwear bore the identify of a small Swedish city, Skelleftea, which gave away fewer than 1,000 of the scarves to former residents in 2017 as a part of an annual custom. For residents of the traditionally impartial nation, the presence of the headband on a Jan. 6 rioter raised the chilling prospect {that a} fellow Swede could have tried to intrude within the American transition of energy.
Within the absence of a reputation, the advert hoc on-line group of novice researchers devoted to figuring out individuals within the riot tagged the person #SwedishScarf. And take a look at as they could, even after figuring out him as a member of a bunch of right-wing activists in Los Angeles, his actual identify eluded them.
Even when the Division of Justice indicted Swedish Scarf and two different members of the activist group in November 2021, in an uncommon transfer, prosecutors redacted his identify. The DOJ declined to remark.
The redaction has allowed the true id of Swedish Scarf to stay a thriller — till now.
His identify is Paul Belosic, and much from Sweden’s subarctic winters and common well being care, the 49-year-old really grew up among the many palm bushes and celebrities of Los Angeles, based on interviews with a dozen pals and former associates, a number of of whom requested that their names be withheld out of security issues. They describe Belosic’s flip towards extremism as “heartbreaking” and puzzle over how a onetime George Bush-hating liberal might vote for Donald Trump, not to mention take part in an tried rebel at his behest.
However in addition they inform the story of an aspiring actor whose profession stagnated; who grew up surrounded by Hollywood’s wealth and fame, however who didn’t make it onto the pink carpet himself. As an alternative, he labored jobs in service of L.A.’s celebrities and plutocrats, relegated to driving their vehicles at tony institutions just like the Beverly Hills Lodge and Malibu Seashore Inn and serving them drinks at The Hollywood Athletic Membership.
Belosic’s lifelong rebellious spirit and skepticism towards authority metastasized through the years, they are saying, main him to more and more radical beliefs. This got here to a head in 2020 amid the backlash towards racial justice protests and COVID-19 public well being security measures. At a weekly conservative rally held in Beverly Hills, Belosic — going by the pseudonym Jeff — fell in with a bunch of right-wing activists who hated masks, liked Trump and got here to see the 2020 election as stolen. Members of the group made plans to journey to Washington, D.C., to “violently take away traitors,” based on prosecutors and a former member of the group.
However as their failure grew to become extra obvious within the hours and days after the tried rebel, Belosic vanished, forsaking his pals, household, alleged co-conspirators and — among the many damaged glass and particles of the Capitol’s west entrance — a red-and-white scarf from Sweden.
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Jan. 6 was not Belosic’s first encounter with riot police. In sharp distinction to his eventual flip towards far-right politics, he attended a protest and live performance outdoors the 2000 Democratic Nationwide Conference in Los Angeles. The headlining group, Rage Towards the Machine, opened their set throughout the road from the Staples Heart because the conference’s marquee speaker, then-President Invoice Clinton, strode onstage inside.
“Our democracy has been hijacked!” band frontman Zack de la Rocha screamed to a crowd of 8,000. The band’s message that evening was much less liberal or conservative than typically anti-establishment. “Our electoral freedoms on this nation are over as long as it’s managed by firms! We’re not going to permit these streets to be taken over by the Democrats or the Republicans!”
After the efficiency, police clashed with protesters and bystanders, firing tear gasoline and rubber bullets and swinging batons, based on stories. A lot of the media consideration on the time centered on allegations of extreme pressure by legislation enforcement (the Metropolis of Los Angeles ultimately paid out greater than $5 million to settle claims of abuses).
“They got here in with tear gasoline, they got here in with rubber bullets, taking pictures at us,” Belosic informed ABC Information on the time. “There was nowhere to go right here. All the pieces was blocked off. It was chaos.”
Belosic informed The Village Voice that he and a number of other different demonstrators have been struck with batons by police blocks away from the protest zone. “We had a proper to be right here,” he mentioned.
Given this historical past of protest, pals of Belosic say they have been shocked — however hardly shocked — after they discovered pictures and movies of him on the Capitol, asserting his rights as he noticed them. “That is Harmony and Lexington, 1775!” he yelled to the advancing crowd on the Capitol steps. “If we lose our freedom right here, we lose all of it!”
By coincidence, days after the riot (however earlier than studying about Belosic’s function), Bianca White was chatting together with her good friend and her husband at her residence in Los Angeles about how lengthy it had been since they’d seen Belosic, a virtually lifelong good friend whom she had met in center faculty. “I wouldn’t be shocked if he stormed the Capitol,” she remembers joking.
Belosic had lengthy fostered a fame for ending up in locations he had no place being — usually to comical, charming impact. He as soon as talked his method right into a star-studded Oscar get together whereas carrying sweatpants, White remembers. He had danced onstage with Iggy Pop, one other good friend says. Others recall that he even made it onto the stage at Coachella in 2009 handy a guitar to Paul McCartney.
“It appeared like he was residing for these moments. A bit of bit for the story, the thrill of it, but additionally the telling of it after. I feel a number of younger males are like that, however the level is, you hope that one would develop out of that,” one good friend says.
However when, months after the assault, a mutual good friend despatched White an Instagram put up of footage from the Capitol, she couldn’t snicker it off. “It broke my coronary heart in so some ways,” she says.
Belosic couldn’t be reached for remark. Belosic’s mom declined to take part in an interview, however informed me, “I’ve not had any contact with him since earlier than Jan. 6. I have no idea the place he’s or what he’s doing.”
Way back to elementary faculty, Belosic displayed defiance towards authority. Although nicely preferred by his classmates, he had a fame for moving into hassle, pals from the time recall. Even again then, he “wished to not drift and to buck the system,” says one classmate from the Okay-8 personal Catholic faculty Belosic attended.
Others who knew him on the time recall indicators of a tense residence life. Paul Carbone, who attended grammar faculty with Belosic and grew up just a few blocks from him, says that Belosic would come to his home in highschool to assist mow his garden, which he discovered unusual. “I keep in mind he had a tough childhood relationship along with his dad,” he says. “He was making an attempt to get away from his home.”
After highschool, whereas Belosic’s pals and friends principally went on to four-year schools and universities, he pursued an appearing profession — first in New York Metropolis, returning to Los Angeles by 1997, pals say.
He “actually wished to be an actor,” says a former good friend and actor who knew Belosic on the time. “He liked films. He liked Previous Hollywood,” the good friend says. Belosic particularly liked noir, from classics like Raymond Chandler to cross-genre noirs like Blade Runner.
However even along with his love for the medium, Belosic appeared to not grasp the humbling drudgery of the business for these breaking in.
“I really feel like I used to be the one pursuing it, and he was the one ready for it,” says the good friend, who remembers doing “the grunt work of calling brokers and sending out footage” whereas Belosic “was all the time looking for a connection to the person who might hook him up.”
Belosic and White, who first met in center faculty, reconnected as soon as Belosic returned to Los Angeles and began working at The Hollywood Athletic Membership, an upscale billiards bar and music venue — the primary of many such jobs he held within the service sector.
“I received as much as the bar and I keep in mind seeing this man that seemed form of like Brad Pitt,” remembers White. “Rapidly, I used to be like, ‘Oh my God, it’s Paul!’ “
The 2 grew to become shut pals from that time ahead, even residing collectively for stints within the aughts. Like Belosic, White labored in and adjoining to the leisure business, first as a fancy dress designer after which as a intercourse and relationship coach. However White additionally introduced Belosic into nearer proximity to Hollywood’s elite by her stepfather, investor and producer Rick Guerin Jr., whose manufacturing firm Tapestry Movies put out films together with Level Break and Marriage ceremony Crashers. Belosic was a daily visitor on the events held at Guerin’s Beverly Hills mansion.
White shared pictures of Belosic from through the years to substantiate his id, together with a photograph of him at her 2019 wedding ceremony sporting his now-infamous beard.
Whereas White labored as a wardrobe stylist, she would typically go along with Belosic to central casting at his invitation to choose up work as an additional. That is the place she first heard Belosic make use of his stage identify, Thomas Redding. When requested by one other good friend in regards to the selection, that good friend remembers Belosic saying, “It sounds elegant.”
White remembers a special clarification — one which cohered with Belosic’s burgeoning libertarian sentiments. As the 2 crammed out time playing cards for a gig, he crammed in his stage identify and informed her to place down a pretend Social Safety quantity. “I don’t let the federal government take any cash out of this,” she says he informed her.
IMDb solely lists one appearing function for Paul Belosic, as “Clear-cut Airman” on the low-budget indie quick Radius from 2004. Belosic is briefly talked about in a ebook in regards to the film by director Helmut Kobler. Kobler didn’t reply to a request for remark.
A person who pals establish as Belosic additionally seems in a number of music movies as an additional, together with the video for John Mayer’s “Larger Than My Physique” and LeAnn Rimes’ “We Can” in 2009 and 2010, respectively.
One in all Belosic’s extra outstanding (although nonetheless uncredited) appearances got here within the 2011 Oscar-winning movie The Artist, wherein he performed an uncredited cameraman, based on pals. (Debe Waisman, who forged extras for The Artist, didn’t reply to an inquiry.)
Thomas Redding has equally scant credit, with just one appearing function, for a nonspeaking half in a Charlie’s Angels parody internet sequence in 2017.
Regardless of his a long time of labor within the business, Belosic by no means supported himself by his craft, pals say, as an alternative working service sector jobs like many struggling actors. However pals say Belosic appeared keen to cover this work from anybody who didn’t already find out about it. When one good friend discovered that Belosic was working as a valet at an upscale resort, “he tried to behave like he wasn’t working there.
“He did develop up round some huge cash,” that good friend says.
Although Belosic was raised within the Cheviot Hills neighborhood of Los Angeles, an prosperous group close to Culver Metropolis and Beverly Hills, those that knew him say that he and his household weren’t themselves notably rich — not less than, not by the requirements of Los Angeles and a few of his shut pals. His father labored within the promoting business and taught at group faculty, based on his obituary.
Belosic appeared to harbor an insecurity round his trajectory in life even early on, telling not less than one good friend that he had attended UCLA like his dad and mom. “Per the UCLA Registrar’s Workplace, no document of an individual named Paul Belosic was discovered,” a communications officer mentioned in response to a question.
***
White and Belosic didn’t talk about politics typically, White says, which is why she remembers so distinctly a dialog they’d in 2016 on the cusp of the presidential election. “Hey, hear, it’s actually right down to the wire proper now. In case you care about me as a lady, please do me a favor,” she remembers telling him. “Vote for anyone however Trump.”
White didn’t anticipate to obtain a lot pushback to her plea given Belosic’s politics earlier in life. One good friend who knew him in his early 20s remembers Belosic giving him a tough time for his conservative leanings, and describes Belosic as “a staunch Democrat” and “an enormous fan of FDR” on the time. One other good friend remembers prolonged conversations wherein Belosic would rail towards then-President George Bush and the invasion of Iraq.
However one thing had modified by 2016. In response to White’s appeals, he launched right into a lecture on “Hillary and her emails and Pizzagate,” she says. “It was like, full-on QAnon.”
Whereas Belosic brazenly talked politics at events early in life, by his 30s, he got here to acknowledge the diploma to which his views had diverged from that of his circle. He confided in one in every of his extra centrist pals that “he wouldn’t inform his views to lots of people as a result of he would lose pals,” one says.
On the time, this good friend says he didn’t assume Belosic really believed the conspiracy theories, however was as an alternative enamored with the bizarro meme-fueled counterculture of the alt-right.
By 2020, nevertheless, Belosic gave loads of indications that he was a real believer.
As Los Angeles and the world tried to curb the unfold of coronavirus, hundreds took to the streets of L.A. to precise their outrage over the videotaped homicide of George Floyd. The town noticed unrest unprecedented for the reason that 1991 Rodney King beating verdict, however this time the unrest unfold to wealthier and whiter areas of town, reaching so far as Beverly Hills’ Rodeo Drive.
Belosic considered himself as one of many final strains of protection towards BLM and black-clad Antifa rioters in a Democrat Blue metropolis that refused to guard itself for concern of liberal censure, White says. He informed her that he was in there combating at “floor zero” through the riots and protests, referring particularly to Beverly Hills. Because the George Floyd protests slowed, hampered by activist fatigue and alleged police abuses, the rich enclave emerged because the hub of the right-wing backlash towards COVID public well being security measures in L.A.
Whereas town of Beverly Hills went for each Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden in 2016 and 2020, respectively, each gained by slimmer margins than in surrounding localities. Nonetheless, town’s political id takes after Clinton-era Democratic values and their latent conservatism, with an emphasis on enterprise, legislation enforcement and nominal help for social causes — help illustrated by projecting George Floyd’s identify on Metropolis Corridor whereas, one block away, Beverly Hills Police Division officers fired tear gasoline and fewer deadly munitions at nonviolent protesters.
Towards this backdrop emerged the Beverly Hills Freedom Rally, a weekly gathering in entrance of the extremely photographed Beverly Hills signal. The occasion, which kicked off in July in opposition to lockdown insurance policies, grew from just a few dozen to a couple thousand by the November 2020 presidential election and noticed participation by members of teams just like the Proud Boys.
That is the place I first met Belosic. On Aug. 22, 2020, he had traveled to Beverly Hills from a QAnon “Save Our Kids” protest in Hollywood held earlier within the day. Pictures from the Hollywood occasion present Belosic in entrance of Hollywood Excessive Faculty carrying an indication that reads, “Pedowood desires to fuck eat and drink your youngsters.”
On Rodeo Drive, with police splitting their consideration between a small group of counter-protesters and the a lot bigger conservative group, I approached Belosic, who launched himself as Jeff. He resembled a person I had seen ejected from a Juneteenth BLM protest. I requested if that had been him. With out extra specifics, Belosic informed me, “I’ve been to so many rallies that I can’t keep in mind, it may need been me.” (Mates who later reviewed pictures of the person mentioned it was not Belosic.)
Once I informed him I used to be a neighborhood journalist, he mentioned that he couldn’t “consider the form of craziness that’s taking place, it’s simply disgusting.”
Unprompted, he supplied: “I’ve been a resident of Rodeo [Drive] for 25 years.” He then gave the handle of a close-by residence on the road that’s synonymous with wealth, which turned out to be the childhood residence of a detailed good friend, not his personal.
Quickly after my dialog with Belosic, violence erupted on the Freedom Rally. Amid the fray of the brawl, a rally-goer sprayed a caustic substance into the face of a journalist and repeatedly slammed a metallic baseball bat into his helmeted head.
Movies from the Freedom Rallies caught the eye of Daniel “DJ” Rodriguez (one in every of Belosic’s eventual alleged Jan. 6 co-conspirators). Rodriguez grew to become a daily attendee of the Beverly Hills protests, spending what little spare cash he had on gasoline for the 120-mile spherical journey drive from his residence in Fontana, California, he would later inform the FBI.
Like Belosic, Rodriguez had floundered all through his life, based on a sentencing memo filed by his protection lawyer. A highschool dropout from Fontana who grew up with out his father, he labored varied “low-level” jobs and had moved again in along with his mom in 2015 after a interval of homelessness. “He struggled to discover a place the place he felt he really belonged,” the sentencing memo reads. “However as soon as he discovered President Trump and the ‘Make America Nice Once more’ motion, that each one modified.”
On June 21, a federal decide sentenced Rodriguez to greater than 12 years in jail for his actions on the Capitol.
One other common Freedom Rally attendee was Edward Badalian, a 26-year-old who would come carrying desert-beige physique armor and whom a decide later described as a “very self-satisfied younger man.” (Badalian was additionally later indicted for his actions on Jan. 6 and was ultimately convicted of conspiracy, obstruction of an official continuing and aiding and abetting, and tampering with paperwork or proceedings. He was awaiting sentencing on the time of publication.)
Even with Badalian, Rodriguez and different members of the right-wing activist scene, nevertheless, Belosic maintained a level of privateness, going by his nom de guerre, Jeff, based on court docket information, interviews and movies. One fellow Beverly Hills Freedom Rallier and salon proprietor who attended the Jan. 6 riot, Gina Bisignano — the esthetician who handed Belosic a megaphone by the damaged window — says she felt the 2 had cast a romantic connection on Jan. 6. Even she believed that his identify was Jeff.
(Bisignano, who made her personal name to motion with the identical bullhorn for “gasoline masks,” “weapons,” and “indignant patriots” to defend “our Trumpy Bear,” pleaded responsible to 6 costs and never responsible to a cost of felony obstruction of an official continuing.)
Along with the Freedom Rallies, Belosic participated in additional disruptive actions all through the summer time of 2020, together with one on the Westfield Century Metropolis mall the place he accosted consumers and employees carrying masks (which have been required by metropolis well being officers).
Footage from this protest grew to become wealthy fodder for on-line novice investigators, who had discovered Belosic and his telltale beard in pictures and movies from the L.A.-area protests. Feeding into the prevailing Swedish nationwide principle, Belosic repeatedly cited Sweden’s coronavirus response in his diatribes to beleaguered mall workers. The Nordic nation had develop into a favourite speaking level of these against masks and lockdowns for its comparatively relaxed strategy to illness mitigation.
“Sweden by no means locked down, Sweden by no means had masks,” Belosic informed a Shake Shack worker.
“You’re interrupting working individuals,” the worker responded. “So go to Congress. Discuss to the president. Discuss to everyone else that’s in control of [the COVID response], as a result of we don’t run the federal government, we don’t run the nation, I’m not the president, I’m simply the restaurant supervisor, so discuss to them.”
Three days later, Belosic did precisely that, touchdown at Washington Dulles Worldwide Airport within the early morning of Jan. 6, based on prosecutors. Quickly after, he met up in downtown D.C. with Rodriguez and Badalian, who had pushed cross nation in a van from Los Angeles “with weapons and tactical gear.” By the afternoon, Belosic despatched a textual content to an unnamed recipient that learn, “we’re on the capitol steps, it’s going off, the individuals are breaking down the limitations, the battle has begun.”
Video from the day exhibits Belosic urging the group to “take the scaffolding” abutting the Capitol, yelling, “If we don’t struggle right here, we lose all of it!” Belosic is later seen carrying a police riot helmet and standing by as one other rioter sprays an obvious chemical substance at Capitol police, shouting on the officers, “Fuck you, communist pigs!”
After leaving the Capitol, Belosic joined Badalian and Rodriguez at an Airbnb rented by a bunch that had traveled to D.C. for the rally and riot. To a few of their group, the motion that day appeared a hit, at first. Rodriguez giddily texted a bunch chat, “Omg I did a lot fucking shit rn and received away inform you later,” based on court docket information. He added: “tazzzzed the fuck out of the blue,” referring to his assault of then-D.C. police officer Michael Fanone with an electroshock weapon. Fanone spoke at Rodriguez’s sentencing, telling the decide the bodily and psychological trauma of the Jan. 6 assault prematurely ended his law-enforcement profession.
However by the following day, the truth of the state of affairs appeared to daybreak on Belosic, who canceled his return flight to California and joined Badalian and Rodriguez on their drive again west.
On Jan. 10, the three of them paid a go to to Bisignano, who had unintentionally recognized Badalian throughout an Infowars phase the 2 had participated in two days earlier. After stepping inside her Beverly Hills rental, Belosic walked by her residence and unplugged all of Bisignano’s Amazon Alexa units, “miming” that she ought to “not converse out loud,” based on the indictment. He then scrawled in a pocket book, “I need to enable you delete all the things and switch the information to a safe arduous drive.”
The prison criticism for Belosic tracks his whereabouts as much as Jan. 19, when he makes one other go to to Bisignano. After that, the path goes chilly so far as the official document is worried. However Belosic has damaged his radio silence along with his family members not less than as soon as for the reason that assault on the Capitol, emailing his youngest brother “to inform him that all the things is nice and that he’s touring,” based on a screenshot of a textual content dialog.
Neither of Belosic’s two brothers replied to requests for remark.
***
After White first observed Belosic in movies from the riot, phrase unfold pretty shortly amongst their good friend group. Why, they puzzled, had Belosic gone in such a special route from all of them?
Belosic had skilled a sequence of losses, White says, together with the 2003 demise of his father. However it was a breakup with a girlfriend round his early 40s that gave the impression to be “the straw that broke the camel’s again,” sending him right into a depressive spiral, White says. This was when Belosic grew out his “mountain man” beard, telling one involved good friend in regards to the look: “I received my coronary heart damaged by some lady and I don’t give a fuck.”
“OK, so that is Paul being brokenhearted,” the good friend remembers considering. “However it by no means stopped.”
Others commented on the obvious stagnation of Belosic’s life, particularly when in comparison with the progress of his friends, not to mention his ambitions for himself. Outdoors of appearing, Belosic had spoken for years of touring to the Democratic Republic of the Congo to guard endangered gorillas from poachers, a number of pals recall. He even practiced residing on a food plan of beans and rice to arrange for all times within the bush.
However in her a long time of figuring out him, White might recall just one journey Belosic made overseas, and that was to Sweden round 2018. She and one other shut good friend had been encouraging Belosic to take an “Eat, Pray, Love” journey to someplace like Bali or Costa Rica, however he settled on Sweden due to ancestral Nordic ties, White and others say.
How he obtained the headband of worldwide curiosity, neither she nor others I spoke with know, however the thriller has impressed an ongoing documentary effort by Swedish director Mattias Löw that’s slated for launch in 2024.
Belosic’s time within the bowels of Hollywood could have additionally primed him for his descent into extremism and his conspiratorial worldview — one which takes particular goal at leisure elites because the producers of social ills. Joseph Falsetti, a former actor who additionally appeared as an additional in The Artist and remembers assembly Belosic, says the expertise of background appearing can foster a way of grievance.
“You’re an invisible individual, you’re on the backside of the totem pole,” he says. “Individuals really feel a bit helpless after they try this for a time period.”
One former good friend — the actor — noticed Belosic’s thwarted ambition specific itself in his melodramatic declarations on the Capitol, describing it as overwrought film dialogue.
Considered by that prism, Belosic’s actions on the Capitol and his fateful sartorial selection that morning have satirically earned him what a long time within the business didn’t — a starring function in a staggering epic.
This story first appeared within the Aug. 9 concern of LeslyNewsMagazine journal. Click on right here to subscribe.