Attack on Pelosi's husband echoes threats pro-Trump rioters made on Jan. 6 while stalking the Capitol's halls

• An intruder shouted, "Where is Nancy?" after breaking into House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's home.
• The intruder violently attacked Pelosi's husband, Paul, with a hammer in front of police officers.

It was a menacing question that rang through the Capitol on January 6, 2021: "Where is Nancy?"

In the months since a pro-Trump mob stormed the Capitol, versions of that question have appeared in court papers as federal prosecutors have accused rioters of threatening House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other lawmakers. In one case, prosecutors noted someone in the crowd who could be heard yelling, "Nancy...Nancy...We're coming for you Nancy."

"Where's Nancy Pelosi?" asked another Capitol rioter, David Antonio Ticas, who was sentenced to two weeks in prison after admitting to entering the Capitol on January 6.

On Friday, an intruder brought that threat to Pelosi's home in San Francisco. Echoing the question of several Capitol rioters on January 6, the intruder shouted, "Where is Nancy, where is Nancy?" as he confronted the House speaker's husband, Paul, who was hospitalized following the violent attack.

In a statement, the House speaker's office said Paul Pelosi had suffered a fractured skull was receiving "excellent medical care and is expected to make a full recovery." The House speaker was in Washington, DC, under the protection of her security detail at the time of the assault, her office said.

In the wave of nearly 900 prosecutions stemming from the January 6 attack, prosecutors have underscored the threat Speaker Pelosi faced as one of the most prominent targets — along with then-Vice President Mike Pence — of the pro-Trump mob.

During the first jury trial in a January 6 case, prosecutors called to the stand a former member of the far-right Three Percenters militia, who recalled joking on the drive from Texas to Washington, DC, about dragging lawmakers out of the Capitol by their heels on January 6. Testifying against Capitol rioter Guy Reffitt, the witness specifically remembered joking about House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's head hitting the stairs on the way out of the building.

"I didn't think it was anything someone was going to act on," the witness, Rocky Hardie, told jurors. A jury found Reffitt guilty on all five charges he faced in connection with the January 6 attack, and a judge later sentenced him to more than 7 years in prison.

In another case, prosecutors said a St. Louis man, William Merry, roamed the Capitol on January 6 chanting, "Nancy, Nancy," and on multiple occasions called the House speaker a "c**t." Merry reached the speaker's suite, where he encouraged his niece to pick up a shard of Pelosi's office sign.

The sign had been smashed by another rioter, prosecutors said, "and then proudly displayed" on the grounds of the Capitol.