Tag: riots

DOJ Retracts Claim It Seized ‘Fully Constructed’ Lego Set From Accused Capitol Rioter

The Department of Justice has retracted its claim that it seized a “fully constructed U.S. Capitol Lego set” from an accused Capitol rioter.

In an memorandum asking a court to order Robert Morss be held pending trial, prosecutors claimed that law enforcement officials “recover[e]d a fully constructed U.S. Capitol Lego set” while arresting the defendant.

But in a supplemental motion, authorities said they erred in conveying that claim.

“Please note that after a review of the photographs from the search, there appears to have been a miscommunication and that statement appears to be inaccurate. The Lego set was in a box and not fully constructed at the time of the search, as pictured below,” they wrote.

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Violent Extremists Took Over The US Capitol Long Before January 6

No longer content with absurd claims that the January 6 Capitol riot was as bad as the 9/11 attacks, Democratic Party-aligned pundits are now insisting that it was in fact worse.

On a recent appearance with MSNBC’s ReidOut with Joy Reid, former Bush strategist Matthew Dowd said he felt the Capitol riot was “much worse” than 9/11 and that this is the “most perilous point in time” since the beginning of the American Civil War.

“To me, though there was less loss of life on January 6, January 6 was worse than 9/11, because it’s continued to rip our country apart and get permission for people to pursue autocratic means, and so I think we’re in a much worse place than we’ve been,” Dowd said. “I think we’re in the most perilous point in time since 1861 in the advent of the Civil War.”

“I do too,” Reid said.

Not to be outdone, Lincoln Project co-founder Steve Smith cited Dowd’s hysterical claim but adding that not only was January 6 worse than 9/11, but it was actually going to kill more Americans somehow, even counting all those killed in the US wars which ensued from the 9/11 attacks.

“He couldn’t be more right,” Schmidt said at a town hall for the Lincoln Project. “The 1/6 attack for the future of the country was a profoundly more dangerous event than the 9/11 attacks. And in the end, the 1/6 attacks are likely to kill a lot more Americans than were killed in the 9/11 attacks, which will include the casualties of the wars that lasted 20 years following.”

A total of 2,996 Americans were killed in the 9/11 attacks, and a further seven thousand US troops have been killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. Exactly one person was killed in the January 6 riot, and it was a rioter shot by police inside the Capitol Building. Early reports that rioters had beaten a police officer to death with a fire extinguisher turned out to have been false.

These bizarre alternate-reality takes are awful for a whole host of reasons, including the fact that this so-called “insurrection” everyone is still shrieking about never at any point in its planning or enactment had a higher than zero percent chance of overthrowing the most powerful government in the world, and the fact that they are manufacturing consent for new authoritarian measures just like 9/11 did.

But perhaps the most annoying thing about all the melodramatic garment-rending over how close the US Capitol came to being taken over by violent extremists is that the US Capitol has been under the control of violent extremists for a very long time already.

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Naming the Capitol Police Officer Who Killed Unarmed Jan. 6 Rioter Ashli Babbitt

Most police departments—including Washington, D.C.’s Metropolitan Police—are required to release an officer’s name within days of a fatal shooting. Not the U.S. Capitol Police, which is controlled by Congress and answers only to Congress. It can keep the public in the dark about the identity and investigation of an officer involved in a shooting indefinitely.

Which is what happened with the Jan. 6 shooting of Ashli Babbitt, an unarmed protester in the U.S. Capitol riot who was fatally wounded by a plainclothes police lieutenant as she attempted to breach a set of doors inside the building.

For the past six months, as Congress has proposed legislation to reform police departments across the country, the Capitol Police has stiff-armed government watchdogs, journalists and even lawyers for Babbitt, who have sought the identity of the officer and additional details about the shooting. The USCP still refuses to release his name, in stark contrast to recent high-profile police shootings around the nation.

In February, USCP issued a press release promising to “share additional information once the investigation is complete.” But Justice Department investigators closed their probe in April, clearing the officer of criminal wrongdoing in Babbitt’s death, which the medical examiner ruled a homicide. And last month, the D.C. Police—which shares jurisdiction with the Capitol Police and has led the investigation into Babbitt’s shooting—concluded its own internal review of the shooting without making any findings, according to spokeswoman Kristen Metzger. Still, USCP continues “stonewalling the public,” according to the head of the police union.

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With a straight face, government argues Legos are evidence of a terror plot?

A Pennsylvania man arrested for the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol built a replica Capitol with Legos prior to the attack, federal prosecutors said. Feds seized the Lego set from his home in North Pittsburgh, Business Insider reported.

Prosecutors announced the ‘discovery’ on July 2 since they want to use it as evidence to keep him locked up.

In addition, he had plans to form a militia. It included steps on training. Militias are legal.

Morss is on video in the Capitol and prosecutors say he was involved in the attack on DC officer Daniel Hodges who can be seen in video crushed against a door as people pour through.

The FBI seized Morss’ Legos and his notebook. Not only were all the invading people in the Capitol unarmed, at least one has Legos at home, and he made a Lego Capitol. What more do you need?

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Facebook is banning anyone charged (not convicted) with participating in January 6 US Capitol riot

Facebook has revealed that it will ban anyone who’s charged in connection with the riot at the US Capitol on January 6 and may start “fact-checking” claims that the riot was staged.

In an article detailing how Alan Hostetter, a man who has been charged with obstructing official government proceedings and breaching restricted government property, was banned from Facebook and Instagram within hours of posting a video describing the January 6 riot as a “false flag” and a “fakesurrection” because he believed infiltrators were in the crowd, The Washington Post notes that:

“Facebook says that it does not allow people charged in the insurrection on the platform and that it may fact-check claims that the riot was staged.”

In the case of Hostetter, the prosecutors do not allege that he was violent or entered the Capitol building but claim that he “pushed through the area that the law enforcement officers had been blocking, moved up the stairs onto a structure erected for the Inauguration, and continued moving on to the Upper West Terrace.”

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The “Deprogramming” Begins: Public Defender Representing January 6th Defendants “Re-Educates” Them

Defendants in the Jan. 6th Capitol case are being deprogrammed by their own lawyer.

A public defender named H. Heather Shaner, we’re assured by Ryan J. Reilly of the Huffington Post, has no option but to defend the January 6 “attackers” because “who can’t afford their own attorneys, as guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution and as laid out in the Criminal Justice Act.”

But she’s also taking the opportunity to re-educate her clients, so they aren’t racist anymore.

“Reading books and then watching these shows is like a revelation,” Shaner told HuffPost. “I think that education is a very powerful tool … So I gave them book lists and shows that they should watch.”

…

Shaner said her clients had poor educations and knew very little about the country. Her two female clients took to the task with zeal, Shaner said and got library cards for the first time in their lives.

“Both my women are like, ‘I never learned this in school. Why don’t I know about this?’” Shaner said. (A couple of the male clients weren’t quite as eager students, she said. “The men are very much like ‘Oh, I’ll get to it.’” But she said some of her male clients have been doing some self-education.) (source)

S0, if I understand this correctly, those poor dumb hick women just needed someone to help them see the error of their ways and introduce them to the joy of the public library, but the men refused to be womansplained to?

And how was this case race-related? It was purely political.

Shaner represents six of more than 500 Capitol defendants: Anna Morgan-Lloyd, Annie Howell, Jack Jesse Griffith (aka Juan Bibiano), Israel Tutrow, and Landon Kenneth Copeland.

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FBI Arrests 69-Year-Old LA Woman for Entering US Capitol “Without Lawful Authority” But Post Photo in Her Case Packet of Capitol Police Holding the Door for Her

The Stasi FBI tracked down, staked out and arrested a 69-year-old woman and Los Angeles County employee on Monday morning for walking into the US Capitol 5 months ago.

Lois Lynn McNicoll was charged with “knowingly entering or remaining in any restricted building or grounds without lawful authority and violent entry and disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds.”

None of that is true. Lois McNicoll was neither “disorderly” nor “violent” during her walk around the US Capitol on January 6th with hundreds of other American patriots.

And as far as having the “lawful authority” to enter the US Capitol — The FBI slipped up and posted a photo of Lois walking through the door with a US Capitol police officer holding the door for her.

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FBI tears innocent New Yorker’s life into shreds after Jan. 6

Joseph Bolanos was a pillar of his community. President of his Upper West Side block association for the past 23 years, he looked out for his neighbors during the pandemic. He dropped off masks and kept extra heaters in his rent-controlled apartment for seniors. He raised morale with a weekly street dance to show his support for essential workers. 

A Red Cross volunteer after the 9/11 attacks, the 69-year-old security consultant once received a police commendation for heroism after saving a woman from being mugged. 

Unmarried, and caring for his 94-year-old mother, he was a well-loved character in the quiet residential area. 

But now his neighbors think he is a domestic terrorist. 

Yes, he attended then-President Donald Trump’s rally in Washington, DC, on Jan. 6, but he never entered the Capitol. He was in a friend’s room at the JW Marriott a 30-minute walk away when the Capitol breach occurred. 

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