The chief federal judge in Washington D.C. said Thursday that the Justice Department is not being aggressive enough with January 6th rioters, calling the prosecutorial approach “almost schizophrenic.”
In a sentencing hearing, Judge Beryl A. Howell asked prosecutors why so many people charged with participating in the violent attack on the U.S. Capitol are allowed to strike plea deals to relatively minor charges.
“Is it the government’s view that the members of the mob that engaged in the Capitol attack on January 6 were simply trespassers?” Howell asked. “Is general deterrence going to be served by letting rioters who broke into the Capitol, overran the police . . . broke into the building through windows and doors . . . resolve their criminal liability through petty offense pleas?”
“This is a muddled approach by the government,” Howell added. “No wonder parts of this public are confused about whether what happened on January 6 at the Capitol was simply a petty offense of trespassing, with some disorderliness, or was shocking criminal conduct that posed a grave threat to our democratic norms.”
Howell, an Obama appointee, offered her criticism while sentencing rioter Jack Griffith of Tennessee. Prosecutors wanted to impose a three month jail sentence on Griffith for breaching the Capitol.
“Instead,” explains CNN, “Howell sentenced Griffith to three months of house arrest and three years of probation. She said she was constrained by the fact that Griffith was allowed to plead guilty to a low-level crime, and because prosecutors recommending probation for other rioters in comparable situations. (Federal judges are required by law to give similar punishments in similar cases.)”
“My hands are tied,” Howell said in frustration. “In all my years on the bench, I’ve never been in this position before, and it’s all due to the government, despite calling this the crime of the century, resolving it with a . . . petty offense.”
“After all that scorching rhetoric … the government goes on to describe the rioters who got through the police lines and got into the building as ‘those who trespassed,’” Howell added. “This was no mere trespass.”
Howell also criticized the paltry fine she was asked to impose upon Griffith for restitution: $500.
Howell said if all rioters received similar monetary penalties “it doesn’t even come close” to paying for the damage inflicted on the Capitol.
POLITICO reports:
Howell’s decision was a highly anticipated milestone in the wide-ranging prosecution of more than 700 Jan. 6 defendants. She has taken a leading role in pressing prosecutors to consider the broader threat to democracy that the riot presented when considering charges and punishment for participants. And her words, as the chief of the District Court blocks from the Capitol, often carry more weight than those of her colleagues. She has consistently expressed alarm and skepticism about prosecutors’ ginger language and approach to some of the initial cases before her court — and she attributed public “confusion” about the seriousness of the Capitol attack to the government’s approach.
