Six Inauguration Day ‘Protestors’ Found Not Guilty On All Charges
Trials of many others to come: “We are over-the-moon thrilled with the results.”
The first six people of approximately two hundred arrested for rioting on inauguration day faced a jury this past week. We noted in a recent post:
The jury found them not guilty on all charges. I’m beginning to think you can get away with pretty much anything in this country if you have leftist politics.
Zoe Tilliman reports at BuzzFeed:
Inauguration Protesters Found Not Guilty On All Charges In Jury Trial
A jury on Thursday found six defendants not guilty on all charges they were facing in connection with Inauguration Day protests in Washington, DC.
This was the first trial for the nearly 200 defendants still facing charges in connection with anti-Trump demonstrations on Jan. 20 that turned violent.
The verdict is a victory not only for the six defendants and their lawyers, but for other defense attorneys, anti-Trump activists, and free speech advocates who had criticized the mass arrests and prosecution as examples of government overreach and who worried the case signaled a new era of criminalizing political dissent.
“The jury thoughtfully distinguished First Amendment rights from criminal conduct,” Steven McCool, one of the defense lawyers, told BuzzFeed News in an email. “They vindicated the constitutional rights of these defendants and all of us.
Asked about the verdict, one of the defendants, Alexei Wood, told BuzzFeed News in a text message: “Fuk them so hard.”
More trials for other defendants are scheduled throughout 2018. A question going forward will be if the acquittal prompts the government to drop any cases or charges or if prosecutors will press ahead as planned. In a statement, however, the US Attorney’s Office suggested it planned to move forward with the remaining pending charges against other defendants.
“The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia believes that the evidence shows that a riot occurred on January 20, 2017, during which numerous public and private properties were damaged or destroyed. This destruction impacted many who live and work in the District of Columbia, and created a danger for all who were nearby,” per the statement. “The criminal justice process ensures that every defendant is judged based on his or her personal conduct and intent. We appreciate the jury’s close examination of the individual conduct and intent of each defendant during this trial and respect its verdict. In the remaining pending cases, we look forward to the same rigorous review for each defendant.”
Here’s a video report from Ruptly TV:
Do you notice hw everyone involved is suddenly celebrating the importance of free speech? Funny how that becomes sacred again when leftists are cleared for rioting and destroying property. Conservatives speaking on college campuses? Not so much.
Vice News has more:
Outside the courtroom Thursday, defendants and their attorneys celebrated.
“I think it means a lot for free speech,” said Jamie Heine, attorney for Macchio. “We are over-the-moon thrilled with the results.”
A lawyer for another defendant said he’s pleased the jury recognized the difference between legal protest and illegal activity. “I think that it shows that when you’re putting a case like this together you have to make tough decisions and draw lines and decide between those who are engaged in constitutionally protected activity and criminal activity,” said Steven McCool, attorney for Oliver Harris…
Jurors were asked to consider whether an individual was guilty by association if individuals they were with were committing acts of vandalism. Defense attorneys argued that police made arrests indiscriminately that day, and punished those exercising their right to free speech. Prosecutors said that the defendants were trying to use the First Amendment to exonerate themselves from criminal activity.
It’s great to hear so many people care about the First Amendment now. That doesn’t change what happened on inauguration day. This wasn’t a peaceful protest. It was goons in black masks starting fires and engaging in violence and intimidation.
John Sexton of Hot Air is spot on here:
The message of this acquittal is going to be loud and clear to Antifa: Wearing masks is a get out of jail free card. As long as no one can identify who broke which window or who started which fire, you’re safe from all consequences. This was their plan all along. I guarantee you some of these 200 people know exactly who did what. Some of them recognize their friends in those videos, but they are operating as a gang. No one will snitch on their fellow gang members.
Featured image via YouTube.
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Comments
Shine yeah, let them walk….let them continue to burn, vandalize and destroy. Every single Republican up for reelection needs to make this a part of their campaign. Make it visible for all to see what the Democrats, the progressives, the left and the rest of “the resistance” think is hunky-dory and “over the moon”.
PRESIDENT Donald Trump !
This, too, shall pass. Then we can return to being great.
You are a useless turd.
Karma will catch up with them eventually. It might not be today or tomorrow but karma is a bitch and never forgets.
Also, I’m not in favour if finding people guilty just because of association. You absolutely have to prove that the person you are targeting broke the law otherwise we are no better than Obama’s America!
Trump had better hope there is no such thing as Karma, Jesus or Satan.
It is comforting that Trump is good at subtle distinctions in matters such as ‘association’. Not
Heh… that’s funny, a thug like YellowSnake saying someone ELSE should hope there’s no such thing as justice.
Thanks for the laugh.
Trump has counted on that his whole life. Heh, heh
“The jury found them not guilty on all charges. I’m beginning to think you can get away with pretty much anything in this country if you have leftist politics.”
Sad, but true. It’s why last week I downplayed the likelihood of conviction for this riotous political protest.
I found this article at PBS, so its veracity may be in question, but this quote stood out: “Prosecutors also interviewed dozens of witnesses, but none who could identify any of the defendants as a perpetrator.” I think ‘could’ should be changed to ‘would,’ but I’m silly that way.
However, it strikes me as the lynch pin for this acquittal. Cryptic social media messages or CCTV or other circumstantial evidence of mobs gone wild simply won’t spur a jury to convict without a John Q Citizen pointing out in court ‘That’s the guy!’
“‘The jury thoughtfully distinguished First Amendment rights from criminal conduct,” Steven McCool, (said) one of the defense lawyers…'” That would be laughable, if it wasn’t tragic.
The hypocrisy is that the political ilk which frequently cries about ‘group rights’ or ‘protected classes’ scurry back under the Constitutional protections of individual rights when they stand accused of crimes.
The only consolation prize comes from Blackstone: “It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer.”
Merry Christmas.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/jury-acquits-all-6-defendants-in-first-trial-for-inauguration-day-violence
These people were not random people picked up on the street. They were identified by some means. In this case, most were identified through CCTV. One ten second video of a clearly identifiable person smashing a jewelry store windwo, reaching inside and running off with a fist full of jewelry beats 10 people who swear that person did not commit the crime. Except of course in DC and other liberal bastions.
This is all about political ideology trumping the rule of law. If these people had been doing this against the Obama administration, they would already be serving sentences.
“One ten second video of a clearly identifiable person smashing a jewelry store windwo, reaching inside and running off with a fist full of jewelry beats 10 people who swear that person did not commit the crime.”
This is true, and a good point, but I don’t think it applies to the acquitted 6 in this story, or numerous others who are members of this masked mob rampaging through the streets.
IMHO, since the lawyers, advocates, and resisters are so keen on individual constitutional rights to protect them from prosecution, the DOJ should try each accused individually, instead of in groups. I think odds of conviction from a jury increase substantially with a one on one prosecution.
IE: Alinsky 13 – ‘Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.’
Could it be the the US Attorney overreached?
Does the author really thing the left is monolithic? Are you sure that the protestors on trial were at even 1 college campus preventing anyone from speaking? I would forgive them if it was a professional provocateur like Milo Yiannopoulos or Ann Coulter. They need the protesters to make a living and would probably pay them to not go away.
Is the right monolithic? Can we judge DJT by the alt-right? Well, in that case the answer is: YES.
“Could it be the the US Attorney overreached?” It’s possible, on a certain level. It’s obvious crimes were committed by this masked mob rampaging through the streets, but reasonable proof is required.
IMHO, since the lawyers, advocates, and resisters are so keen on individual constitutional rights to protect them from prosecution, the DOJ should try each accused individually, instead of in groups. I think odds of conviction from a jury increase substantially with a one on one prosecution.
IE: Alinsky 13 – ‘Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.’
You’ve got two conflicting forces here on the US Attorney:
1) He *wants* to line them up by ‘guilt,’ find the most guilty one of the bunch, and hammer him into the ground like a tent stake. Then move to the next, and the next, until the rest of the line realize how important it is for their future outside of bars to rat out their supposed friends. At which point, the plea bargains fly and the most guilty go to jail for a long period.
2) If he does the above, the least guilty of the bunch become sympathy magnets, because the single mother of five with a mortgage and a wounded dog elicits a great deal of it. So the longer the accumulation of evidence and process of trial goes on with the guility-est, the less justice you’re serving on the lightweight wingnuts who deserve a five-minute misdemeanor trial, sub-thousand dollar fine plus court costs, and a promise not to do it again.
Seriously, good video surveillance before and during the arrest should help. Leftist rioters do *not* go peacefully, or without profanity.
“Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, the defendant claims to be only exerting his right to free speech, but when he was arrested, as in the video clip you are about to see, please note the club and bottle of urine the officers remove from him as he rants and threatens them…”
Could it be that you’re a skeevy little spineless idiot that everyone laughs at, mocks, and ridicules? You betcha!
It is beyond question that you are the very stereotype of the causes you embrace.
I doubt you are laughing. Your seem enraged. In a couple of years you will probably be driving a truck into a bunch of peaceful protesters.
yellowbelly’s group, the communists, murdered 100 miilion+
That is where it’s sympathy lives.
I adhere to our Constitution. If that makes me a ‘commie’ in your eyes then you need to get some glasses. Maybe you, like Trump, never read it. Maybe you planned to take to the hills and use 2nd amendment remedies, like Trump suggested, if he lost?
You are such a tool.
Metric or good ole American?
Well, sure. One can’t apprehend just any old protester and convict him of rioting unless he was actually rioting. Whether somebody else in the crowd was rioting or not is hardly relevant.
Judging from what few specifics I’ve heard of this, I’d say the jury made the right call. Standing around in the street and grousing is pure First Amendment—right of the people peaceably to assemble. The “assembly” implies a group; but the only realistic way to evaluate the “peaceably” part is individually.
Just at a guess, the prosecution here considered that (1) windows were broken and property torched, therefore (2) the “assembly” was not “peaceable”; therefore (3) any participant in the “assembly” has lost his First Amendment protections, even if he (as an individual) was acceptably “peaceable”, so (4) he can be charged for the destruction and vandalism that he didn’t commit.
This line of reasoning is an essential part of warfare. Nobody ever claimed that any individual dockyard workers in Hamburg were even slightly responsible for the German attacks on Poland or France, or for the bombings of London or Rotterdam; nevertheless it’s perfectly legal to incinerate them to ash while they’re sheltering in the cellars of their homes. Group responsibility is a legal fiction which is, in very specific cases, entirely legitimate. This is why some are such sticklers for procedural niceties, such as formal declarations of war. But a declaration of war on some subset of the US population is not a useful concept.
Personally, I would like to know more about the composition of the jury.
I’d be willing to bet a large majority of leftists and a few centrist and/or conservatives that didn’t want to have their own houses burned, looted, and vandalized.
How can we make a judgement on the verdict? Yes there was a riot and destruction of property but I have not heard of any evidence that was presented against these six defendants.
Did the prosecutor have a really weak case or was this jury nullification? How are we to know?
Good for them! That ol’middle class, nice complexion, good teeth, we’re more intelligent, compassionate and “woke” than you, “white privilege” worked! Bless their antifa hearts.
So. Leftist protesters are not accountable under the Rule of Law. Check. Thanks for clearing that up, Jury.
“If you are above the Law, you are outside the Law and the Law no longer protects you”
If Obama can carry out elective regimes changes, force refugee crises, and recreate the trail of tears, then a few anarchists are a mild progression.
This is why my policy with Rioters is shoot first to kill.
If there’s a riot going on, and a person so much as spits at me, I’m going to empty the clip at them. I DO NOT take chances with my safety or the safety of my family. Under riot circumstances, I am going to consider any action directed at me that is not entirely peaceful as a deadly threat, and act accordingly.
Nobody is denying you that right. But be damn careful that you shoot the right people. According to the jurors they didn’t think these particular people broke the law. Obviously, a few did while the others were involved in an angry, but lawful, protest.
After which the Jury of Washington DC residents retired to Walmart for an afternoon of shoplifting and vandalism
Two simple proposals to discourage rioting.
1) Make the act of disguising one’s self during a protest a crime.
2) Make the process the punishment.