As Jan. 6 prisoners continue to languish in jail without trials, without bond and in subhuman conditions, two Jan. 6 attorneys are claiming the government is manufacturing evidence to arrest and incarcerate them. Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) says the government is also “hiding evidence” that could possibly exonerate some of them.
A History of Fabricating Evidence
In July of 2018, the infamous Steele dossier was revealed to be little more than a collection of unverified opposition research funded by Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee (DNC), to obtain a warrant to spy on former Trump campaign volunteer Carter Page and to derail the Trump campaign.J-6 Cases: ‘Manipulating Evidence’
Joseph McBride, an attorney for multiple Jan. 6 prisoners and defendants, is certain the government is “manipulating evidence.”“In terms of attorneys,” McBride told The Epoch Times, “I’m probably the most outspoken attorney in the United States of America who is representing Jan. 6 defendants.”
McBride said he has “five, going on six” criminal defendants related to Jan. 6 and three civil rights cases. He also represented five Jan. 6 defendants before the Jan. 6 committee. Considering the depth of his involvement, McBride believes he’s “far and away” the most eligible and outspoken attorney among those attached to the Jan. 6 legal battles.
Suspicious Affidavits
McBride also says the government’s use of lengthy and extravagantly detailed affidavits is “much different than your normal cases and they’re frontloading these complaints with facts that aren’t proven and these allegations are subsequently being weaponized in the court of public opinion.”According to McBride, complaint affidavits are generally written as hastily as possible because the only purpose of a complaint affidavit is to initiate the legal process by establishing probable cause. Complaint affidavits are normally followed quickly by the return of an indictment by a grand jury.
But the Jan. 6 complaint affidavits can run in excess of 20, 30, 40, and even 50 pages long, which begs the question of “why?”
For McBride, the answer is simple. Because Department of Justice (DOJ) policy only allows the government to make public comments about matters that are already a matter of public record, making sure all of that detail is part of the public record enables the government to release this information to the public to destroy the reputations of the accused ahead of a trial.
Another Jan. 6 attorney, Bill Shipley, is equally convinced the government is manufacturing evidence to support a narrative.
The Case of Brian Mock
According to the 14-page Criminal Complaint (pdf), Brian Christopher Mock has been charged with: “Assaulting, Resisting, or Impeding Certain Officers, Knowingly Entering or Remaining in any Restricted Building or Grounds Without Lawful Authority; Disorderly and Disruptive Conduct in a Restricted Building or Grounds, Obstruction of Law Enforcement During Civil Disorder, Acts of Physical Violence in any of the Capitol Buildings or Grounds.”However, all of the charges are based on screen grabs from videos that do not confirm the allegations.
Shipley told The Epoch Times “both the government and the court have acknowledged that video 1 does not show any actual assault by defendant Mock as alleged in the indictment.”
“If video 1 showed Mr. Mock kicking the fallen officer it would have been simple to write, ‘The video shows Mr. Mock kicking the fallen officer,’” Shipley said. “Judge Howell didn’t write that because video 1 doesn’t show that. The government knows it, Mr. Mock knows it, and Judge Howell knew it.
“The simple reality is that video 1 shows the unidentified victim officer already on the ground when Mr. Mock is first seen on camera. There are two other protesters—one wearing camouflage and the other wearing a red hat—on the ground with the victim officer at the moment defendant Mock is first seen. Defendant Mock is standing in close proximity to the three of them. He is not seen shoving the fallen officer to the ground.”
According to Shipley, the entire segment of video 1, which is relevant to the first alleged assault, lasts only four seconds. At no point during those four seconds does video 1 show Mock’s foot making contact with any part of the Officer’s body.
“If the government had video of Mr. Mock’s right foot striking the victim officer, it is quite certain it would have included a screenshot of that particular moment instead of the one it choose,” Shipley argued. “The obvious conclusion is the government has no such video. It hasn’t produced one in discovery.”
In another incident, Mock is accused of shoving an officer to the ground, causing and injury to the officer’s right elbow.
“According to Victim 2, his right elbow hit the ground right in the area where two pads come together after the shove, causing excruciating pain at the time of impact.”The complaint affidavit is dated June 10, 2021, precisely one month after the interview of the officer. During the 30 days between those two documents, the mechanics of how the officer injured his elbow changed. She first wrote he suffered the injury to his elbow “during the melee,” without reference to Mock or his actions. However, one month later, Alvarez wrote that his right elbow hit the ground right in the area where the two pads come together as a result of Mock’s shove.
The Case of Lucas Denny
According to a 42-page criminal complaint (pdf), Denny is charged with: “Assaulting, Resisting, or Impeding Certain Officers with a Deadly or Dangerous Weapon, Civil Disorder, Obstruction of an Official Proceeding, Conspiracy to Obstruct an Official Proceeding, Entering and Remaining in a Restricted Building or Grounds with a Deadly or Dangerous Weapon, Disorderly and Disruptive Conduct in a Restricted Building or Grounds with a Deadly or Dangerous Weapon, Engaging in Physical Violence in a Restricted Building or Grounds with a Deadly or Dangerous Weapon, and an Act of Physical Violence in the Capitol Building.”“Officer K.K. then deployed a crowd-control spray and Denney retreated into the crowd.
Shipley said when the government presented this case to the grand jury on the morning of March 7, 2022, the single-count grand jury indictment that was returned charged Denney with “using a dangerous or deadly weapon, that is, a long gray-in-color pole, did forcibly assault” Officer K.K. of the Metropolitan Police Department.
However, the body-worn camera footage from Officer K.K.’s camera showed that the pole was flexed in a manner inconsistent with metal.
“This is not a circumstance where Special Agent Farris was acting under time pressure,” Shipley contends. “His affidavit in support of the complaint was signed on December 7, 2021, 11 months after the incident. The fact that Farris would be so careless—at best—as to describe the object as a ’metal pole' when the video clearly shows it was not—a fact conceded by the government when it was unwilling to go on the record with the grand jury that the pole in question as made of metal—is more than sufficient reason to adopt a cautious approach to any of the other conclusions drawn by Farris in his affidavit.”
According to My Law Questions: “A false affidavit is one in which a person signs it and swears that the statements attested to in the document are true, complete, and accurate when the statements are in fact misleading or false. Submitting a false affidavit is a criminal offense and constitutes perjury in most jurisdictions.”The Case of Christopher Worrell
According to a 17-page criminal complaint (pdf), Christopher Worrell is charged with: “Entering and Remaining in a Restricted Building or Grounds with a Deadly or Dangerous Weapon, Disorderly and Disruptive Conduct in a Restricted Building or Grounds with a Deadly or Dangerous Weapon, Engaging in Physical Violence in a Restricted Building or Grounds Using a Deadly or Dangerous Weapon, Act of Physical Violence in the Capitol Grounds or Buildings, Civil Disorder, Assaulting, Resisting, or Impeding Certain Officers Using a Dangerous Weapon.”Despite the repeated allegations of using/possessing a “deadly or dangerous weapon,” specifically spraying “pepper gel” at Capitol Hill police, there is no evidence of Worrell actually spraying pepper gel at police officers.
The FBI Task Manager who filed the report admits from the beginning, he did “not currently know with certainty the target at which WORRELL was spraying.”
In the criminal complaint is a photo, supplied by an unnamed photographer, that shows two Capitol Police officers (circled in green) standing atop a staircase near a dark statue wrapped in plastic. Both are leaning forward, spraying the people below—who are standing peacefully and posing no threat to them—in the face with pepper gel. Multiple people in the crowd can be seen covering their faces and reacting in pain. Worrell (circled in red) can be seen standing a sizeable distance away, recording the incident like several others with his cell phone.
There are multiple photos showing a line of police officers standing in a completely different location that do not show where Worrell was standing in relationship to them.
Moreover, after admitting he did not “currently know with certainty the target at which WORRELL was spraying,” and having no evidence showing the target of the pepper gel, why did the investigating agent still said he believes “the likely intended target of WORRELL’s pepper pray assault was the line of law enforcement officers present in these photographs.”
Evidence Withheld
Machinations such as this remind Gohmert of the Ted Stevens case from back in 2008.“In the Ted Stevens case, we found out the FBI created evidence and hid evidence in order to get a conviction,” Gohmert told The Epoch Times. “He ended up being exonerated but only after he lost his election. We also know that Project Veritas caught a Democratic leader saying we paid for people to come in and instigate violence at Trump events so we could claim Trump was violent. All of these things in the background and you come forward to January 6.”
“We still can’t get all of the videotape,” Gohmert said, referencing the 14,000 hours of surveillance video from Capitol security cameras that has been withheld under “sovereign immunity.” The evidence could be used in the defense of those charged in relation to the incident and being held in jail.
“They continue to hide that information,” Gohmert asserted. “As every lawyer knows who has dealt with any criminal case, it’s been a Constitutional requirement for the Supreme Court for decades, if you have evidence that’s of an exonerating nature for the defendant, you have to turn that over.”
The Epoch Times reached out to the FBI and DOJ for comment.
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