U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Matthew Graves announced late last week during a DOJ press conference that the Justice Department has largely focused its criminal prosecutions on individuals who entered the Capitol or assaulted law enforcement officers on Jan. 6, 2021, when lawmakers were certifying the 2020 presidential election.
{snip}
Mr. Graves added, however, that the DOJ will put more effort into prosecuting the thousands of protesters who were outside around the Capitol but did not enter the building or commit “violent or rough acts.”
He continued, “If a person knowingly entered a restricted area without authorization, they had already committed a federal crime. Make no mistake, thousands of people [were] occupying the area that they were not authorized to be present in in the first place.”
Over 1,230 people have been charged with federal crimes in the capitol riot. This includes misdemeanor offenses such as trespassing to felonies such as assaulting police officers and seditious conspiracy.
About 730 people pled guilty to charges, while an additional 170 have been convicted of at least one charge at a trial decided by a judge or a jury, according to an Associated Press database.
President Biden, during remarks at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, Saturday, boasted about the number of Jan. 6 defendants who have been sentenced to prison.
“Since that day more than 1,200 people have been charged for assaulting the Capitol. More than 900 have been convicted or pleaded guilty,” Mr. Biden said. “Collectively to date, they have been sentenced to more than 840 years in prison.”
{snip}
Former President Donald Trump rallied his base in Iowa on the eve of the Jan. 6 anniversary.
“The J6 hostages, I call them. Nobody has been treated ever in history so badly as those people nobody’s ever been treated in our country,” Mr. Trump said noting he would grant clemency to a “large portion” of those Jan. 6 defendants who served time.
The FBI’s Tampa field office announced on Saturday the bureau arrested three Jan. 6 “fugitives” during a pre-dawn raid.
Authorities took Jonathan Daniel Pollock, Olivia Michele Pollock and Joseph Daniel Hutchinson III into custody.
The defendants are scheduled to appear in Federal Court in Ocala, Florida, on Monday.
* Original Article:
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2024/jan/7/doj-target-nonviolent-jan-6-protesters-who-did-not/?utm_source=smartnews.com&utm_medium=smartnews&utm_campaign=smartnews%20
