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“Some have compared what happened on January 6 with other protests that have taken place across the country over the past year and have suggested that the rioters on Capitol Hill are being treated unfairly,” Chutkan said during a sentencing hearing. “I absolutely disagree.”
Although she did not mention any names, it seemed undeniable that Chutkan was responding – almost point by point – to the analysis of Judge Trevor McFadden, who sits alongside him in the US District Court in Washington, DC, where more than 600 defendants are facing charges for their roles in the attack on Capitol Hill.
On Friday, McFadden said federal prosecutors undermined the Jan.6 lawsuit by doing little to impose legal consequences on those who revolted during protests against racial justice last year.
“I think the American lawyer would have more credibility if he was impartial in his concerns about the riots and the mobs in this city,” he said at another sentencing hearing, according to the Associated Press.
Comments from the dueling judges reflect what appears to be a developing schism in the federal justice system over how to deal with lower-level defendants who have turned to the attempted insurgency of the extremists who led the indictment of the 6 January.
Attorney General Merrick Garland, who previously worked in the same courthouse with judges who took a stand in the Jan.6 cases, defended prosecutors on Monday against complaints that some rioters on Capitol Hill had been allowed to sort out their cases. cases admitting misdemeanors.
“I’m very much aware that there are people who blame us for not suing enough and others complain that we sue too harshly,” Garland said in a video interview for the New Yorker Festival. “It’s part of any prosecutor’s territory anyway. “
While many of the more serious cases remain unresolved – and will likely run into 2022 – dozens of crime cases are being resolved at a suddenly rapid pace. And that gives the judges their first chance to weigh in on the larger character of the Capitol assault.
McFadden, who was nominated by former President Donald Trump, appears to be one voice, for now, on the DC bench. Several judges expressed a sentiment similar to Chutkan’s: Those who joined the Jan.6 crowd helped overwhelm police and stretch resources in a way that helped violent extremists threaten the transfer of power.
“What happened … was nothing less than a violent mob trying to prevent the orderly and peaceful transfer of power in an election,” said Chutkan, a person named by the former. President Barack Obama. “This mob was trying to overthrow the government. … This is not a simple protest.
Justice Emmet Sullivan, appointed by former President Bill Clinton, lamented last week that during the events of January 6, a number of ordinary and law-abiding Americans “turned into terrorists.”
In sentencing hearings last week, Judge James Boasberg made it clear that he agreed that those who remained non-violent on January 6 did indeed encourage violence.
“There are few actions as serious as the one this group took on this day,” said Boasberg, a person appointed by Obama. “If there are five people or eight people or 10 or 15, there is no riot. … The encouragement and incitement of other people is what led to the violence.
And Judge Paul Friedman, a person appointed by Clinton who sentenced the accused Valerie Ehrke on Jan.6 to probation, said he expected his light sentence to be the exception, not the norm, for crimes that threatened democracy.
In Monday’s conviction of Matthew Carl Mazzocco, Chutkan admitted that the Texas resident did not break into the Capitol, damage any property there, or commit violence, but said he and others who entered the seat of Congress illegally bore some responsibility for the chaos that unfolded.
“The people who were committing these violent acts did so because they had number security – including Mr. Mazzocco,” Chutkan said.
McFadden’s statement echoes arguments that have been made by many defendants, by Trump himself and by his allies on Capitol Hill.
At Friday’s sentencing hearing, McFadden berated the defendant in front of him, Danielle Doyle, for “acting like all those looters and rioters last year.” This is because the looters and rioters decided that the law did not apply to them.
The judge said Doyle’s behavior was not excusable, called it a “national embarrassment” and again compared it to the demonstrations of police brutality after the death of George Floyd last year that made “we all feel less secure,” the AP reported.
McFadden, in particular, took a hard line with some of the January 6 defendants. He ordered the pre-trial detention of Timothy Hale-Cusanelli, an Army reservist who wore a Hitler mustache at his work at a naval weapons base, citing Hale-Cusanelli’s violent rhetoric and his adherence to what he believed to be an imminent civil war.
However, on Monday, Chutkan objected to McFadden’s suggestion that the January 6 rioters were being treated unfairly and harshly. She argued that, in fact, many of those indicted in the unrest on Capitol Hill had been treated more gently than those arrested for rioting alongside the Black Lives Matter protests.
For example, Chutkan said, the Capitol suspects were not arrested on the spot and were allowed to remain in their home quarters during numerous proceedings. And prosecutors have agreed to allow many of them to plead guilty to a single misdemeanor charge, Chutkan noted, although they have charged most with at least four offenses.
Chutkan also said that the basis of the Black Lives Matter protests – racial justice – differs sharply from the focus of the Jan.6 event, assembled by Trump as he promoted discredited claims that the election of 2020 had been stolen. The defendant she sentenced on Monday, Mazzocco, went to Capitol Hill for Trump, not for a democratic cause, she said.
“He went to Capitol Hill to support a man, not to support our country,” Chutkan said.
McFadden and Chutkan did not differ only in their assessment of the January 6 misdemeanor crimes. The two also differed over the sentences they handed down in the cases they handled.
While McFadden handed Doyle two months probation and a fine of $ 3,000, Chutkan handed Mazzocco 45 days in jail – a harsher sentence than the three months of house arrest requested by prosecutors.
“This court believes that a probation sentence does not reflect the gravity of the crime. … There must be consequences for participating in an attempted violent overthrow of the government, beyond just sitting at home, ”Chutkan said on Monday. “The country is watching. … If Mr. Mazzocco gets away with probation and a slap on the wrist, that won’t deter anyone from trying again what he did.
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