If there is one image from Jan. 6th that will remain indelible with the day, it is the “QAnon Shaman.” Bare chested and wearing an animal headdress, horns and red-white-and-blue face paint, Jake Angeli Chansley is to the Capitol riot what Rosie the Riveter was to World War II. Howling and “chanting an unintelligible mantra” on the Senate floor, he is the embodiment of the unhinged rage that led to one of the most disgraceful attacks on our constitutional process in history.
However, the newly released Fox footage from that day raises serious questions over the prosecution and punishment of Chansley. The videotapes aired on Tucker Carlson this week show Chansley being escorted by officers through the Capitol. Two officers appear to not only guide him to the floor but actually appear to be trying to open locked doors for him. At one point, Chansley is shown walking unimpeded through a large number of armed officers with his four-foot flag-draped spear and horned Viking helmet on his way to the Senate floor.
It is otherworldly footage. While I admit that I approach these stories from the perspective of a long-standing criminal defense attorney, I would be outraged if I was unable to see such evidence before a plea or sentencing. At no point in the videotapes does Chansley appear violent or threatening. Indeed, he appears to thank the officers for their guidance and assistance. On the Senate floor, Chansley actually gave a prayer to thank the officers agreed “to allow us into the building.”
Before addressing the legal implications of this footage, one thing should be clear. The public should have been given access to this footage long ago and the Jan. 6th Committee withheld important evidence on what occurred inside the Capitol on that day.
While it is understandable that many would object to Carlson being given an exclusive in the initial release, many in the media are denouncing the release of the footage to the public at all. The press and pundits are now opposing greater transparency in resisting any contradiction of the narrative put forward by the Jan. 6th Committee. Indeed, MSNBC’s Jason Johnson angrily objected that this is “federal evidence” — ignoring that it is evidence that was denied to criminal defendants.
This is not just material that the public should be able to see, it was potential evidence in criminal cases like that of the QAnon Shaman.
When the footage aired, I wrote a column raising the question of whether this evidence was known to or shared with Chansley’s defense. After all, he was portrayed as a violent offender by the Justice Department at his sentencing.
It now appears that the answer is no. I spoke with Chansley’s new counsel, Bill Shipley, and confirmed that defense counsel did not have this material.
In the hearing, federal prosecutor Kimberly Paschall played videos showing Chansley yelling along with the crowd and insisted “that is not peaceful.”
That portrayal of Chansley would have been more difficult to maintain if the Court was allowed to see images of Chansley casually walking through a door of the Capitol with hundreds of other protesters and then being escorted by officers through the Capitol. At no point is he violent and at no point is he shown destroying evidence. Instead, he dutifully follows the officers who facilitate his going eventually to the unoccupied Senate floor.
We all knew that Chansley was treated more harshly because of his visibility. It was his costume, not his conduct, that seemed to drive the sentencing. In the hearing, Judge Royce Lamberth noted, “He made himself the image of the riot, didn’t he? For good or bad, he made himself the very image of this whole event.”
Lamberth hit Chansley with a heavy 41-month sentence for “obstructing a federal proceeding.”
However, the QAnon Shaman was led through the Capitol by officers. Defense counsel could have noted that his “obstruction” in going to an unoccupied Senate floor was facilitated by officers. While the police were clearly trying to deescalate the situation after the Capitol was breached, this is evidence of how Chansley came to the Senate. Indeed, his interaction with officers could have impacted how he viewed the gravity of his conduct. It certainly would have been material to the court in sentencing the conduct.
In his rambling sentencing statement to the court, Chansley apologized for “a lot of bad juju that I never meant to create.”
I have great respect for Judge Lamberth, who has always shown an admirable resistance to public pressure in high profile cases. I cannot imagine that Lamberth would not have found this footage material and frankly alarming.
At first blush, this would appear a clear “Brady violation” when a prosecutor fails to provide a defendant with any evidence that is favorable or exculpatory to his case. Like most things in Chansley’s life, it is a bit more complex than it would seem.
First, Chansley quickly pleaded guilty to the charge. This may have been due in part to the draconian treatment that he received by the Justice Department, which insisted on keeping him in solitary confinement with no apparent justification. The result is that he moved rapidly to sentencing without significant discovery in his case.
Second, the footage was in the possession of the legislative branch so the Justice Department could claim that it was not required to produce it. Indeed, the prosecution may have been entirely unaware of the footage.
Third, Chansley waived an appeal of the plea agreement and is now weeks away from release. The case is practically closed.
It is not clear, however, if Judge Lamberth will find the failure to disclose this evidence troubling and worthy of inquiry. None of this means that Chansley should not have been given jail time. Indeed, it is appropriate to sentence rioters to greater than average time due to the assault on our constitutional process.
Yet, it is hard to believe that Judge Lamberth would have given 41 months to a nonviolent, first offender who was led through the Capitol by police officers to the floor. This was a Navy veteran who pleaded guilty to the crime.
The role of Congress in withholding this footage is disgraceful and wrong. The Congress and the January 6th Committee knew of this footage and its relevance to a pending criminal case. Yet, they refused to make it public. Instead, the January 6th Committee hired a former ABC producer to put on a made-for-television production of highly edited images for public consumption. Countervailing evidence or images were consistently excluded and witnesses appeared as virtual props to support high-quality video packages.
Even The New York Times admitted the narrative was meant to “recast the midterm message” and “give [Democrats] a platform for making a broader case about why they deserve to stay in power.”
The image of the QAnon Shaman being escorted through the Capitol by police officers is hardly the image that they wanted to show the public. So Committee members and counsel buried footage that was clearly relevant to literally hundreds of people facing criminal sentencing across the country. They did this while repeatedly referencing those cases in hearings as upholding the rule of law.
I hold little sympathy for Chansley or the others arrested on that day. I was highly critical of President Donald Trump’s remarks before the riot.
However, it is hard to see this withheld evidence and not conclude that the Qanon Shaman got the shaft on his sentencing.
“At first blush, this would appear a clear “Brady violation” when a prosecutor fails to provide a defendant with any evidence that is favorable or exculpatory to his case.” This Justice Department and its allies in the Washington, DC, judiciary established the questionable doctrine that “Brady” is irrelevant when a defendant pleads guilty. Remember the General Flynn case? Flynn pled guilty to protect his son from being prosecuted and afterwards learned that he was framed by an FBI set-up orchestrated by Jim Comey who bragged about “taking advantage” of the situation to trap and frame Flynn. When this came out, the Department’s failure to make known the frameup was excused on the grounds that because Flynn pled guilty, he was not entitled to receive Brady material. Maybe Congress needs to take another look at this rule or find a case to get this issue before the Supremes so they can clarify the rule. Government-orchestrated frameups should be unlawful.
I can’t believe Turley actually thinbks the video tapes would have mand any difference to the utterly corrupt judges in the DC distric court.
I reserve judgment about the actual culpability of the QAnon Shaman and other J6 prisoners until the release of the rest of the evidence – not just video, but emails, phone calls, etc. – regarding what really happened on J-6 has been made public. What role did some within the federal government play in the incitement? That could amount to entrapment, if not outright, felonious behavior on their part. And I’m talking politicians, not just federal agents stationed in the crowd.The suspicious refusal of Pelosi et al to accept additional protection (an offer made by then-President Trump) is likewise something that requires a much deeper dive. I’m sure the NSA has an interesting collection of salient phone calls and emails that could shed a lot of light on all this…just as I’m sure multiple politicians are quietly (or not so quietly – Schumer) sweating bullets as they contemplate further information making it into the public domain. I also listened to the entire speech of President Trump and at no point did I ever hear him say anything that could be legitimately interpreted as a call to “storm the Bastille,” to engage in violence, to riot, to harm people or property. Instead, I only heard him say PEACEFULLY make voices heard. I did not vote for either major party candidate in 2016, but, watching media distort and lie about the content of his communications, which I did watch in toto – not just select segments – shifted me into appreciating the suspiciously pervasive attacks on him, including the now obvious fraudulent accusations in which the accusers were the real perpetrators.
Sherillyn Wells: A nice, mature, inquisitive comment. Thank you.
Not hittin’ on Sherillyn, eh, lin?
She is very pretty.
“First, Chansley quickly pleaded guilty to the charge. This may have been due in part to the draconian treatment that he received by the Justice Department, which insisted on keeping him in solitary confinement with no apparent justification.”
Hmmm, coerced plea? Maybe the entire charge should be dismissed?
Trump’s observation in 2017 about the Intelligence Community being dubious, and Chuck Schumer’s thinly veiled threatening response, all appear prescient today. Trump warned us, he was right, Americans are next on their hit list.
Schumer warns Trump: Intel officials ‘have six ways from Sunday at getting back at you’
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/schumer-warns-trump-intel-officials-have-six-ways-from-sunday-at-getting-back-at-you
MSNBC and Schumer = fascism in flagrante delicto
Schumer for Shame, nut job extraordinaire!
Here is what I think the videos showed:
1. A lot of people were just milling around. While some people were violent, many were not. I do not know how many who were just milling around have been charged. That would be helpful information.
2. The J6 Committee added audio to the silent video. That artifice added to the impact.
3. The Shaman was escorted through the Capitol by police in a friendly way. No effort was made to stop or detain him. He was not violent. If this exculpatory video was not made available to the defence, as Turley says, that would appear to be a violation.
4. Brian Sicknik appeared at the end unharmed and wearing a helmet. It has long been known that he died of natural causes. But it now seems that he was not even impaired during the event.
5. The J6 Committee “Hawley is a coward” video was extracted from a longer segment showing him to be the last of a large group, all jogging, being directed out by Capitol police. It was a fraud.
6. Ray Epps lied about having left the Capitol when he sent inculpatory text messages.
None of this changed my view of what happened that day. But it did further my understanding of how absurdly biased the J6 Committee, and the DOJ/FBI, have been.
Many open questions remain:
1. The pipe bombs;
2. The response to the killing of Ashli Babit;
3. FBI or other government informants/provocateurs; and
4. The failure to act on the ample intelligence that violence at the Capitol could occur. This was the topic of Tucker’s interview last night.
We are not the old soviet union or the new Putin version of despotism. This is a travesty. The Judge needs to set this right and let this man out of prison immediately!
Yet another example that we have no moral standing calling other countries Banana Republics. The Democrats are gangsters.
NYC lawyers can throw a Molotov Cocktail at a police care and get treated with respect, the judge actually opining that what they did came from a good heart, while the Jan 6 folks were locked in solitary confinement for years and treated like terrorists. Disclaimer: Some of them were violent and should have been treated accordingly, but the NYC lawyers should have been so treated also.
This latest example of life in Doublestandardstan is creating a two tiered justice system that will inevitably fail. We have seen case after case after case of violent guys being let go by radical prosecutors all over the country and yet anyone near the Capital that day is ruined forever. In St Louis a REPEAT criminal caused a young female athlete to lose both of her legs because the VIOLENT criminal was released time and time again. We have seen this a million times and yet the only criminals are right wingers. From clinic protestors being arrested as pro-choice guys bomb churches and pro-life centers not even being investigated. This is sickening and it needs to stop.
Idiots and partisans like Svelaz have no issue with the SPLC LAWYER being involved in actions against police in Atlanta while watching poor slobs like the guy at issue being railroaded into long sentences.
The left is playing hardball while we put into the game milk toasts like McConnell and Lindsey (I’m going to send a strongly worded letter) Graham. People like McConnel and Graham are not the enemy, but they are not fighting the enemy strongly enough.
Another example of the hypocrisy of the media is the treatment of George Santos, an obvious lunatic and someone who shouldn’t be in Congress Svelaz, see how it is possible to be critical of your own party) compared to the treatment of Cori Bush, a much more vocal and out front member of Congress. It seems that Bush has a good friend and bodyguard (odd for a defund the police person) that says he is 109 trillion years old, can summon tornados and is a virulent anti-Semite. Cori also was a “faith healer” and had her own case of Covid cured OVER THE PHONE. Read Guy Benson today for more on this shining light of our Article 1 class.
Just as ilhan Omar married her brother to get around immigrations laws we see that everything is legal if you have a D next to your name.
More to the point, what will happen to the lying weasels on the “January 6 Committee?” Political theater, indeed…
What should be done to the “lying weasels” who abused their power in such reprehensible ways?
Lock them all up and throw away the key.
But what do they do instead? They get hired to teach (ie, brainwash, indoctrinate) your kids.
Cheney is now teaching at UVA.
The other liars, snakes and weasels are spread out amongst other teaching positions.
God help us.
There is plenty of video footage available showing Jake Chansley even telling others who had entered the capitol to be respectful. There is also footage showing police inviting people in and leading them through the building. These people were unarmed, being lead through by armed police.
When will anyone remember the woman who was brutally beaten to death after a group was lead into a tunnel by cops?
Even more revealing were the comments by former Capitol police officer Tank Johnson during his interview by Tucker Carlson. They make even more ludicrous the outcry and protestations from the Senate majority and minority leader as well as others. What, if anything, the House committee intend to do about that, if anything, remains to be seen.
It is now possible to identify the undercover Feds present.
Find them and make them testify.
Get their texts, and their emails.
Get their informants and make them testify.
Jonathan Turley wrote this very significant passage in this blog…
Mistrial?
Government misconduct?
Prosecutorial misconduct?
Steve,
Good questions.
Some defendants are seeking delays to review the videos.
Be interesting to see if they are allowed delays, or those who already have been tried, to seek a retrial under new evidence found.
If denied, suggestion of a double standard?
Can the US legal system suffer yet another round of Americans questioning the trustworthiness of those institutions?
I’ve been told by a lawyer I know that the following apply…
Because he pled guilty, a mistrial motion, which is made during trial, is not appropriate. But, a Motion for New Trial is on the grounds that the prosecution withheld exculpatory evidence from the defense is appropriate. The prosecution is required, even if not requested, to turn over all exculpatory evidence to the defense. Even though the prosecution is required to turn over all exculpatory evidence, it is always good practice to make the formal motion for the production of such evidence.
Saying it was in the hands of Congress is no excuse. The “Police” are employed by the very same Congress.
This has every appearance of an intentional suppression of exculpatory evidence by the government.
The appearance is damning – and made worse because We KNOW that some Defense attorney’s were demanding this – and often the courts said no, or only allowed a little.
Further it would be beyond belief that DOJ does not already have this, and has had it since Jan 7.
These are criminal trials – I would fully expect that DOJ has THOROUGHLY gone through this video looking for evidence of crimes, and looking for new people to charge.
Nor am I critical of that – it is their job.
But it is ALSO their job to provide any exculpatory evidence to the defense.
They could not have searched for inculpatory evidence without finding what we are seeing now.
The prosecutors – AND JUDGES involved in this should be disbarred.
Thi sis a serious ethical violation.
One of the most disturbing things is that
prosecutors, judges, much of the media, democrats, the left do NOT think this is a huge deal.
They have no problem convicting innocent people.
They have no problem denying them due process.
They have no problem hiding exculpatory evidence.
And they have no problem even now With Government – Schumer and even several republicans demanding this be censored.
What government tries to hide, is what we MUST know.
When Republicans finally get to the bottom of this scandalous hoax, hopefully shaman man will not only be granted a pardon, but he’ll be able to sue the pants off the government that sabotaged his constitutional rights. Never has political power been abused so blatantly, yet kept so quiet. The Democrats should be ashamed, but not half as much as the servile media that aids and abets all their crimes.
Keep in mind, every successful lawsuit against ‘the government’ means you and I pay every dollar awarded, NOT anyone who trampled the rights of these wrongly-accused, wrongly-convicted, wrongly-sentenced, defendants. Since I wasn’t there, didn’t accuse anyone of a crime, didn’t find anyone guilty of said crime(s). I, as someone who plays by the rules, should not be held account and punished via more and more taxes to pay for the criminal behavior / criminal actions of government “Officials”.
Stop making excuses for Lambeth. He did what he did and the DC Circuit has allowed the largest violation of constitutional rights since the internment of Japanese-Americans in WW2.
It was obvious to even a casual observer that many of the rioters were being railroaded and the courts were complicit.
Mhj – it is also reminiscent of the political persecutions of “enemies of the State” by Stalin in 1930’s, where helpless and friendless individuals were coerced into quick confessions and sentenced to long terms in the Gulag.
To be respected, justice has to be seen as fair and just.
Millions of Americans have watched the DOJ, the FBI, the federal prison system, and the judiciary combine to punish and crush the 1/6 rioters.
This was not justice.
It was cruel retribution.
Let’s see how the system responds to these revelations.
I am not optimistic.
Absolutely! That was Bastiat’s point as well in The Law.
The Results of
Legal PlunderAbuse of Power.It is impossible to introduce into society a greater change and a greater evil than this: the conversion of the law into an instrument of
plunderabuse of power..What are the consequences of such a perversion? It would require volumes to describe them all. Thus we must content ourselves with pointing out the most striking.
In the first place, it erases from everyone’s conscience the distinction between justice and injustice.
No society can exist unless the laws are respected to a certain degree. The safest way to make laws respected is to make them respectable. When law and morality contradict each other, the citizen has the cruel alternative of either losing his moral sense or losing his respect for the law. These two evils are of equal consequence, and it would be difficult for a person to choose between them.
The nature of law is to maintain justice. This is so much the case that, in the minds of the people, law and justice are one and the same thing. There is in all of us a strong disposition to believe that anything lawful is also legitimate. This belief is so widespread that many persons have erroneously held that things are “just” because law makes them so. Thus, in order to make
plunderabuse of power appear just and sacred to many consciences, it is only necessary for the law to decree and sanction it.http://bastiat.org/en/the_law.html
The progressive clowns have political prisoners. That is not funny. That is evil.
So then, when will the injustice done to Jake Chansley be righted?
That is a fair question.
In other words, “Mission Accomplished!”
We are in a period of maximum Roshomon Effect (Eastern Philosophy) or Cognitive Dissonance (Western Philosophy). Unfortunately, this is the stage when good people do bad things on a mass scale. The best way of preventing the unforgivable bad things is by pointing out the incongruity. If we lose the freedom of the press, we will never see the incongruity until it is too late. Thank you for your article.
The problem is the MSM “Press” have become the propaganda arm of the Dems/libs/progressives.
Hear, hear!
The MSM is the “psy-ops,” propaganda, indoctrination and brainwashing unit of the communist (liberal, progressive, socialist, democrat, RINO, AINO) party in America.
The American Founders and Framers were conservatives.
The Constitution and Bill of Rights are conservative.
Karl Marx published the Communist Manifesto in 1848.
“Crazy Abe” Lincoln seized power in 1860.
“Crazy Abe’s” “Reign of Terror” must have never happened, secession was, is always will be not prohibited by the Constitution and fully constitutional (slavery must have been terminated by legal means).
“Crazy Abe” must have never left a unassimilable, foreign, 3-million-man, standing army on U.S. soil which must have been compassionately repatriated (Naturalization Act of 1802).
The initial act of the nullification and voidance of the Constitution and the incremental implementation of the principles of communism in America was Karl Marx and “Crazy Abe’s” unconstitutional Civil War.
Lincoln espoused, or coined, Marx’s pejoratives, “capitalist” and “act harmoniously to fleece the people,” in 1837.
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Lincoln was Karl Marx’s hero and vice versa.
“Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction.”
– Blaise Pascal
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“The purposes of the Almighty are perfect, and must prevail.”
– Abraham Lincoln
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“These capitalists generally act harmoniously and in concert, to fleece the people.”
– Abraham Lincoln, from his first speech as an Illinois state legislator, 1837
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“Everyone now is more or less a Socialist.”
– Charles Dana, managing editor of the New York Tribune, and Lincoln’s assistant secretary of war, 1848
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“The goal of Socialism is Communism.”
– Vladimir Ilyich Lenin
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“They [the working men of Europe] consider it an earnest of the epoch to come that it fell to the lot of Abraham Lincoln, the single-minded son of the working class, to lead his country through the matchless struggle for the rescue of an enchained race and the RECONSTRUCTION of a social world.”
– Karl Marx Letter of Commendation to Abraham Lincoln, 1864