The largest investigation in US history

After the assault on the Capitol, 1146 people were sent on trial: one of them received 22 years in prison, 500 people are still wanted. This is how this business works

In the case of the assault on the Capitol, more than a thousand people were under court - they are accused of rebellion, violence and disruption of certification of election results. The American lawyer Igor weak says that these processes allowed to find out about what happened on January 6, 2021, the legal system in the states and the conditions of maintenance in investigative insulators.

On January 6, 2021, a crowd of supporters of Donald Trump took the Capitol storm. Congress was forced to interrupt the joint session for several hours, at which the presidential election results took place. The investigation of those events became the largest in the history of the United States in the number of defendants - and even a Watergate scandal surpassed .

32 months after the assault on the Capitol, 1146 people were detained , 657 of them pleaded guilty and concluded transactions with the investigation . The courts managed to make 623 sentences - two accused were fullyjustified , 41 partially, 378 people were punished by deprivation of liberty.

The Ministry of Justice, which in the United States performs the functions of the General Prosecutor's Office, has launched a special site on which you can find documents of the charges and the court for each of the defendants and information about the sentences issued. Accused from 18 to 70 years old, and their average age is about 40 years old; The vast majority of the arrested are men. The largest number of accused is among the inhabitants of Montana, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Virginia, Delaware and Maryland.

The vast majority of the defendants are accused of one or more of four articles:

• illegal entrance and being in the federal building, which is limited by access - 1061 people are accused under these articles;
• The use of violence and the disobedience of the police - 398 people are accused under this article;
• The obstruction of the official procedure and disrespect for Congress - 317 people were accused under this article;
• A conspiracy for the purpose of rebellion - 42 people were accused under this article.

Part of the accused takes place under articles on the destruction and abduction of state property (115 episodes), attacks on journalists and their equipment (11 episodes), illegal possession of weapons (about 10 episodes). On August 1, the team of independent special prosecutor Jack Smith charged former President Donald Trump: the investigation believes that the assault on the Capitol occurred due to his purposeful attempts to maintain power after defeat in the elections.

Illegal entrance and being in the federal building, into which access is limited

This is the most commonly used group of articles.

The most mild option is “conducting processions, demonstrations or pickets in the Capitol building”, punishment under this article cannot exceed six months of imprisonment. Often the prosecutor’s office also uses a soft article about the “intentional entrance or finding in any building or territory with limited access without legal permission to do this”, by which the defendants threatens up to a year of prison. In practice, those who were accused of such crimes received a house arrest or generally cost only the premises under the supervision of law enforcement officers.

A much more stringent accusation was brought against those who brought weapons, threatened legislators, tried to disrupt the Congress meeting or used violence when breaking into the building. For such articles, the defendants threatened up to 10 years in prison.

One of the characteristic matters was the process against John Schubert - the youngest. Initially, he was accused of four articles: illegal finding in the building, where access is limited; destructive behavior in it; the use of violence in the invasion; conducting demonstrations in the Capitol building.

By agreement with the prosecutor’s office, Schubert Jr. pleaded guilty to committing only the last, lighter crime, and the court sentenced him to 18 months of supervision. The case in terms of the remaining three charges was disclosed. Before making the verdict, the judge requested the prosecutors of the video with the actions of the accused and announced the decision only after studying them.

Application of violence and disobedience to the police

In a completely different way, the court approached the accused of applying violence. Many of them were arrested during the investigation, and sentences almost always included imprisonment. Of the 127, who pleaded guilty to the use of violence to police officers 106 were sent to prison; 59 people did not conclude an agreement with the prosecutor’s office and were found guilty of applying violence to the police - not a single accused was justified.

Thomas Webster, a retired policeman from New York, received 10 years in prison after he was convicted by jurors of all six episodes. He was accused of applying violence to a policeman using weapons, disobedience, destructive behavior in a building with limited access and physical violence in Capitol. Webster tried to explain his actions with self -defense: according to him, the policeman was the first to fight with him, and he raised his hands, showing that he was unarmed. On the recording from the police camera it is clear that the defendant broke the flagpole, trying to break through the gap in a police chain, and then began to tear off the protective helmet from the fallen security official.

Albuquerque Head received seven and a half years in prison for attacking the officer with a shield, then grabbed the policeman by the neck, pulled him out of the cordon and threw him into the crowd with a cry "One!" While Head was holding a policeman, several protesters beat the officer, took away the walkie -talkie and used a stun gun against him. As a result, the policeman had such deep wounds around his neck that he had to lay the seams in the hospital. The defendant pleaded guilty, and the prosecutor left only one charge out of 10, despite the fact that Head was arrested 45 times in his native state before participating in the assault on Capitol.

Julian Hater on January 6, 2021 sprayed a gas spray in the face of three police officers. He also pleaded guilty to two episodes of the use of violence using weapons, and the prosecutor's office removed the remaining charges. The court sentenced him to imprisonment for six years and eight months.

Actions to prevent the official procedure and disrespect for congress

Illegal obstruction of the official procedure is a difficult article, the punishment of which is up to 20 years in prison. Due to the evacuation of vice president and legislators, the certification of elections was suspended, and now 317 people are accused under this article.

The most famous of them are Richard Barnett and Jacob Chengley. The first - he burst into the cabinet of the speaker of the House of Representatives of Nancy Pelosi - refused to plead guilty, was convicted of jurors of seven articles and received four and a half years in prison. The second-he was nicknamed the “Qanon Shaman” because of the bright appearance -was accused of six episodes, pleaded guilty only under the article on improving the official procedure and was sentenced to three and a half years in prison.

Conspiracy for the purpose of rebellion

Of the more than a thousand accused, only 42 people are accused of conspiracy for the purpose of rebellion . The last indictment of this article was made in 1995 - it is extremely rare.

Despite the fact that it is very difficult to prove the corpus delicti under this article, the Ministry of Justice decided to use it against members of the ultra -right organizations Oath Keepers and Proud Boys . Many participants in these organizations, including leaders, have already been convicted, some are partially justified by jury, others are still waiting for the consideration of the case. The trials left no doubt that both groups were purposefully prepared not for peaceful protests, but for the assault on the Capitol.

Proud Boys

Proud Boys was created in 2016 and calls himself “Western chauvinists”, preaching mizoginist, Islamofob, transfobic and antimitic ideas. Its name comes from the song from the film "Aladdin", in which the main character apologizes to the mother that he was a bad son, and promises that she will be proud of him. The number of Proud Boys supporters is unknown, but the organization has 119 cells in the territory of 46 states and branches in seven other countries; In Canada and New Zealand, the movement is recognized as terrorist.

Immediately after the elections in November 2020, calls began to sound within the organization to start a civil war. When Donald Trump’s headquarters announced a demonstration in Washington on January 6, 2021, the head of Proud Boys Enrique Tarrio created a special chat from trusted supporters from all over the country in the messenger; He was called the "Ministry of Self -Defense" and devoted to disrupting the certification of election results.

At the very end of December, Tarrio received a plan from an unnamed accomplice, which was called " 1776th returning." The document on nine sheets contained a plan for the capture of several key buildings in Washington, including the Capitols and the buildings surrounding it, which use the congressmen. When the accomplice wrote that “the revolution is above all,” Tarrio replied that everything was serious and he “does not play games”.

Before the assault, the capitol collected money, selected the participants in the attack, purchased equipment for them and paid them the way. Roles were distributed between the top management of the organization: three were promoting the event, several people led regional groups, the rest were engaged in operating work. Proud Boys agreed to act secretly - in civilian clothes - and planned the attack in detail. On January 4, Tarrio met with the leader of Oath Keepers Stuart Roads in the underground garage.

On January 6, the group members met near the Monument to George Washington and moved towards the Capitol. Around noon, the building was already 200-300 participants in Proud Boys. An hour later, a member of the organization was the first to break through a police cordon - right before that he called up with Joseph Biggs, one of the leaders of the organization. Soon, other members of the organization poured into the fenced territory, and the rest of the protesters rushed behind them.

A few minutes later, there were messages from two unnamed group members, indicating the building, appeared in the encrypted chat of the “Ministry of Self -Defense”. Soon, one of the Proud Boys knocked out a window in the building, using the shield taken from the police. The first capitol that came inside the Capitol opened the doors, and a large number of protesters got inside. At about 14:40, the members of the Proud Boys opened another door to the building.

The leader of the organization, which was at that moment, was an hour from Washington, through social networks, he encouraged the protesters, demanded not to leave the Capitol, “to do what should be done”, called the members of the organization a militia and wrote reports of the beginning of the revolution.

During the investigation, part of the members of Proud Boys pleaded guilty, but others demanded a court with the participation of the jury. The first process ended on September 6th. The defendants were the leaders of the organization Enrique Tarrio, Ethan Nordin, Joseph Biggs, Zakhary Rel and Dominic Call - it was he who broke the window with a police shield. The jury found them guilty, only the cunning was justified under an article about the rebellion. Together with accusations of violence against police officers and a breakdown of the Tarrio procedure, he received 22 years in prison, Nordin - 18 years old, Biggs - 16 years old, Rela - 15 years. Judge Timothy Kelly, who conducted the process, was appointed Trump for this position.

Another process will begin in February 2024 - Shane Lamond, one of the former heads of the police of the Columbia district, will be in the dock. He is accused of transmitting information about investigators' plans, helping Tarrio, helping to avoid persecution. From July 2019 to January 2020, Lamond and Tarrio Communized more than 500 times, and before the assault on the Capitol, they opened a secret chat in Telegram, turning on the self-repaid of messages. Lamonda faces up to 30 years in prison for obstruction of justice and five years for three episodes of perjury.

Oath Keepers

The Oath Keepers movement was founded by Stuart Ruds in 2009. Its name comes from the oath that the military and law enforcement officers give - it speaks of the defense of the United States from external and internal enemies. It is the security forces who are former and acting, and make up the backbone of the group. According to traffic statements, he has more than 30 thousand supporters (independent researchers and law enforcement officers estimate their number significantly lower, about five thousand people).

Oath Keepers, like Proud Boys, prepared in advance for the assault on the Capitol. In particular, they created a “quick response team”, which was on duty with firearms in Virginia near the border with Washington. Only Roads himself spent 20 thousand dollars on weapons and cartridges for it, and one of the members of the organization - the retired military Terry Cummings - said in the testimony: "I have not seen so many weapons in one place since the army."

Oath Keepers were divided into groups that acted very professionally. While the first pierced the road inside the building on the one hand, the second stormed another entrance. Inside, one detachment went to the House of Representatives, trying to find the speaker Nance Pelosi (by that time it was already evacuated), and the other unsuccessfully made his way to the Senate through a police stupor.

The jury acquitted three of the five leaders of Oath Keepers on charges of conspiracy to rebel - and all five under the article on the destruction of state property. However, none of them was completely acquitted: the leader of the Stuart Roads group was sentenced to imprisonment for 18 years, and the rest received from four to 12 years in prison.

Future processes

Investigations of cases related to the assault on the Capitol continue. On the FBI website you can find information about the search for more than 500 assault participants, 200 of them have already been identified. Every week, the Ministry of Justice charges two or three participants in the assault. The largest investigation in the history of the United States will continue for many more years, but its unexpected consequence was the interest of American society in the conditions of detention in investigative insulators.

In October 2021, one of the accused, the participant of Proud Boys, Christopher Vorell, demanded exemption from custody for health reasons, but the leadership of the prison did not provide medical documents. The judge recognized the head of the district penitentiary system and the head of the prison guilty of disrespect for the court and demanded that the federal authorities check the conditions of detention of prisoners.

The inspection found out that due to overflow of prison, prisoners limit access to water and food, the guards behave rudely, and the cameras are often polluted by sewage. Because of this, the Washington authorities agreed with the federal government-and transported 400 defendants in Pennsylvania, including many accused in the case of the assault on Capitol.

This did not greatly improve the position of the remaining. A year later, in October 2022, 34 accused signed a sarcastic letter demanding to transfer themselves to Guantanamo , to a prison camp with "good food, the opportunity to see the sun, centers for sports." In a collective letter on yellow notebook paper, prisoners have long listed the problems that are encountered in the insulator - this is black mold, the need to persuade water, the impossibility of praying, poor quality of food. The prisoners write that the security is teasing them with the symbols of the Democratic Party, and the conditions are called "medieval."

In March 2023, congressmen checked the conditions of detention in the isolator. Representatives of the two parties dispersed: Democrat Zhasmin Crkett stated that in her native Texas the conditions in prisons are much worse, and the radical tights Marjori Taylor Green called the conditions terrible and retold complaints of violence arrested and refusal to medical care. The House of Representatives created a special commission to investigate violations of the law when maintaining the accused of the assault on the Capitol.

Igor weak , author of Telegram channel Uslegalnews