Washington — Jeffrey Smith, one of the D.C. police officers beaten and injured during the Capitol insurrection on Jan. 6, 2021, was left traumatized and changed by the events of that day, his widow, Erin Smith, says.
“The man that left on January 6 was not the man that came home in the early hours of January 7,” Smith told CBS News this week. “He was a different person. His personality changed. His demeanor changed. He was there, but the man that I knew was not in the same body.”
The 35-year-old Smith died by suicide on Jan. 15, 2021, as he was driving to work for the first time since the Capitol riot.
In 2022, Erin Smith filed a wrongful death lawsuit for assault and battery against 69-year-old chiropractor David Walls-Kaufman, alleging that he had assaulted her husband during the Capitol riot.
In January 2023, Walls-Kaufman pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor federal count of “parading, demonstrating and picketing in a Capitol building” in connection with the insurrection. At the time, he acknowledged that he had “scuffled” with law enforcement, but did not face any federal assault charges in the case.
He served 60 days in prison on that misdemeanor charge. He was one of hundreds of Capitol insurrectionists pardoned by President Trump in January.
Despite the pardon, Smith’s lawsuit went to trial in June. After a lengthy civil trial and just two hours of deliberations, a jury last week ordered Walls-Kaufman to pay her and her late husband’s estate $500,000, finding that Walls-Kaufman had assaulted Jeffrey Smith on Jan. 6.
In a statement to CBS News, Walls-Kaufman denied striking Smith and called the lawsuit and the verdict “sadistic.”
“It felt like a relief, a relief that all the fighting was worth it, everything that I had done was worth it, and it proves that he was injured,” Smith said of the jury’s decision.
Following her husband’s death, Smith became a reluctant but impactful advocate. She successfully lobbied Congress to pass a bipartisan law in 2022 to allow some police deaths by suicide to be designated as “official line of duty” deaths.
In March of that year, Washington’s Police and Firefighters’ Retirement and Relief Board officially ruled that Smith’s death was in the line of duty. Body camera footage obtained by CBS News appeared to show that Jeffrey Smith was the target of multiple assaults on Jan. 6. Those images helped Erin Smith have her husband’s designation changed.
Now, Smith is pressing the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial in Washington to add her late husband’s name to its wall and include him in an honorary ceremony next May.
She is also calling for the memorial to open eligibility for others for whom it’s been officially determined to have died by suicide because of injuries on the job.
“Getting his name on there is not just for me,” Smith said. “It’s also for his family, his friends, his partner, the people at the Metropolitan Police Department, his colleagues. And it’s also for other officers who have died by suicide due to injuries that they also received at work.”
If you or someone you know is in emotional distress or a suicidal crisis, you can reach the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline by calling or texting 988. You can also chat with the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline here.
For more information about mental health care resources and support, The National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) HelpLine can be reached Monday through Friday, 10 a.m.–10 p.m. ET, at 1-800-950-NAMI (6264) or email info@nami.org.
