Defiant Oath Keepers founder gets 18 years in prison, longest 1/6 sentence yet

[Hans Blaster]

How am I giving them cover if I've said they deserve to be charged and do time?

By simply pointing out that it's a possibility certain people are eager to see them have the book thrown at them for partisan reasons? And further pointing out that the sort of "gloating" occurring isn't necessarily having a productive effect?

By using the same sort of irrelevant comparisons to other situations and crimes that the actual insurrection apologists (and you clearly aren't making excuses for the Jan 6th rioters) use to excuse their behavior on that day. I don't think that's what you want to do, but I think it has that effect nevertheless.

 

[Arcangl86]

Here is the sentencing memo from the prosecution. The DOJ wanted 25 years, which they justified via the guidelines, though I agree a couple of things were a stretch. The U.S. Probation and Pretrial Services System, which is part of the Judicial Branch and not the Executive, from what I can determine recommended between 11-14 years. So the final sentence was between the two.

 

[Hans Blaster]

Here is the sentencing memo from the prosecution. The DOJ wanted 25 years, which they justified via the guidelines, though I agree a couple of things were a stretch. The U.S. Probation and Pretrial Services System, which is part of the Judicial Branch and not the Executive, from what I can determine recommended between 11-14 years. So the final sentence was between the two.

I haven't seen anything about the Probation office's "pre-sentencing report" or calculation, but as I noted in the "consequences" thread when I stepped away from this computer in mid-hearing, the guidelines value the judge had gotten to himself after ruling on all of the adjustments bracketed the 25-year request. If it wasn't exactly the same "level" it was very close. One commentator noted after that the 18 year sentence was *higher* than Rhodes would have gotten under the guidelines without the "terrorism enhancement" though it was lower than with the same enhancement.

Perhaps it is irony that Judge Mehta as a former public defender has gone under the DOJ guidelines calculation and request by several years on five cases that still manage to constitute the 5 largest sentences related to Jan 6th: Watkins (8.5 years, OK), Webster (10 years, violence), Meggs (12 years, OK), Schwartz (14 years, 1 month, violence), and Rhodes (18 years, OK). Or maybe it's just the luck of the draw.

 

[ThatRobGuy]

What I find interesting is how very well so many did afterwards. They were generally privileged, well-educated and had good lawyers.

A lot of it can depend on the judge/prosecutor you're getting as well.

As noted in my previous post, there's a stark contrast in the sentencing patterns of the Jan 6th people depending on which DC federal judge their case landed with.

For just the misdemeanor cases, having your case heard by an Obama appointee was over twice as likely to receive jail time than having it heard by a Trump appointee. (53% to 19%)


And for the record, the inverse pattern existed with sentencing for people involved in BLM rioting.

In conservative red states (and under conservative judges and prosecutors), you had a lot more rioters getting jail time (and ranging from 6 months for things like vandalism to 7 years for arson charges), and in blue areas, rioters getting arrested for the same things, in many cases, got probation, or had prosecutors decline to charge and judges dismissing cases.

Given how polarized the political climate is, it's hard to find a "neutral court" for matters that are politically charged or tightly linked to a hot button political topic.

If one is committing political violence in the name of a "blue cause", they're more likely to get lighter treatment in California or New York than in Kentucky...and vice versa.

It just so happens to be that these Jan 6th people opted to commit their crimes in a jurisdiction where the US District Court is pretty stacked for the blue team.

 

[ThatRobGuy]

By using the same sort of irrelevant comparisons to other situations and crimes that the actual insurrection apologists (and you clearly aren't making excuses for the Jan 6th rioters) use to excuse their behavior on that day. I don't think that's what you want to do, but I think it has that effect nevertheless.

There's a difference between "trying to excuse their behavior" and pointing out inconsistent sentencing.

I've touched on something similar on the drug conversation in the past.
(when we were seeing disparate sentencing between crack cocaine and powder cocaine)

There was a clearly a bias with regards to that (in that case, it happened to be more racial than political, crack was more commonly used by black people, powder cocaine was more likely to be used by white people)

Pointing out that "hey, some people are getting the book thrown at them, while others are getting relatively light sentences, despite the behaviors themselves having a lot of similarities" and partially rejecting the "well, here's why crack is actually worse" as a blanket justification from defenders of the policy wouldn't make one a "crack apologist".

 

[Arcangl86]

I haven't seen anything about the Probation office's "pre-sentencing report" or calculation, but as I noted in the "consequences" thread when I stepped away from this computer in mid-hearing, the guidelines value the judge had gotten to himself after ruling on all of the adjustments bracketed the 25-year request. If it wasn't exactly the same "level" it was very close. One commentator noted after that the 18 year sentence was *higher* than Rhodes would have gotten under the guidelines without the "terrorism enhancement" though it was lower than with the same enhancement.

Perhaps it is irony that Judge Mehta as a former public defender has gone under the DOJ guidelines calculation and request by several years on five cases that still manage to constitute the 5 largest sentences related to Jan 6th: Watkins (8.5 years, OK), Webster (10 years, violence), Meggs (12 years, OK), Schwartz (14 years, 1 month, violence), and Rhodes (18 years, OK). Or maybe it's just the luck of the draw.

I have been able to find the PSR, but I did find the sentencing memo from the defense team arguing that the PSR was too harsh and asking for time served, which is ludicrous for the charges he was convicted of. DocumentCloud

 

[Hans Blaster]

There's a difference between "trying to excuse their behavior" and pointing out inconsistent sentencing.

I know that. You know that. But the rioter sympathizers *use* those alleged inconsistencies and especially comparing unalike things (federal versus state, etc.) sentences to justify their "persecution" complex. That's what I was warning of.

I've touched on something similar on the drug conversation in the past.
(when we were seeing disparate sentencing between crack cocaine and powder cocaine)

There was a clearly a bias with regards to that (in that case, it happened to be more racial than political, crack was more commonly used by black people, powder cocaine was more likely to be used by white people)

Pointing out that "hey, some people are getting the book thrown at them, while others are getting relatively light sentences, despite the behaviors themselves having a lot of similarities" and partially rejecting the "well, here's why crack is actually worse" as a blanket justification from defenders of the policy wouldn't make one a "crack apologist".

I didn't reply to the part about misdemeanor sentencing in Jan6 cases by judge because I am not convinced that the comparison can be accurately done. For starters, your source compared "Obama judges" to the rest rather than Democratic versus Republican nominees. Not sure why only "Obama appointees" were used. I suspect it might be taking advantage of apparent discrepancies involving small number statistics. With enough cases each you can find some things that look like patterns for individual judges and these might reflect any number of biases (including political). Of the judges the only two that stand out are Amy Berman Jackson (Obama appointed) who recently retired to senior status and tends to give out the DOJ requested sentence on misdemeanors along with tongue lashings; and Trevor McFadden (Trump appointed) who seems to look for any excuse to avoid custodial sentences for misdemeanors and is obsessed with the charging decisions and sentences in cases from Summer 2020 in Portland (not so much elsewhere) to the extent that he once ordered the prosecutors to include a table of all sentences for similar cases to the one he was working on in Washington DC, and Oregon over a period that was something like 2020-present.

There are judicial biases, but they are individualized an varied.

 

[civilwarbuff]

I think its hard to compare proper sentences across different categories of crime.

I'm fine with some long time in prison for trying to overthrow our US system of government.

You mean like the Puerto Rican terrorists got for shooting up the House of Representatives?


The 1954 United States Capitol shooting was an attack on March 1, 1954, by four Puerto Rican nationalists who sought to promote the cause of Puerto Rico's independence from US rule. They fired 30 rounds from semi-automatic pistols onto the legislative floor from the Ladies' Gallery (a balcony for visitors) of the House of Representatives chamber within the United States Capitol.

The nationalists, identified as Lolita Lebrón, Rafael Cancel Miranda, Andres Figueroa Cordero, and Irvin Flores Rodríguez, unfurled a Puerto Rican flag and began shooting at Representatives in the 83rd Congress, who were debating an immigration bill. Five Representatives were wounded, one seriously, but all recovered. The assailants were arrested, tried successively in two federal courts and convicted. All received long consecutive sentences, amounting to life imprisonment. Wiki

 

[civilwarbuff]

You mean like the Puerto Rican terrorists got for shooting up the House of Representatives?


The 1954 United States Capitol shooting was an attack on March 1, 1954, by four Puerto Rican nationalists who sought to promote the cause of Puerto Rico's independence from US rule. They fired 30 rounds from semi-automatic pistols onto the legislative floor from the Ladies' Gallery (a balcony for visitors) of the House of Representatives chamber within the United States Capitol.

The nationalists, identified as Lolita Lebrón, Rafael Cancel Miranda, Andres Figueroa Cordero, and Irvin Flores Rodríguez, unfurled a Puerto Rican flag and began shooting at Representatives in the 83rd Congress, who were debating an immigration bill. Five Representatives were wounded, one seriously, but all recovered. The assailants were arrested, tried successively in two federal courts and convicted. All received long consecutive sentences, amounting to life imprisonment. Wiki

BTW, I intentionally left this part out of the last paragraph: In 1978 and 1979, their sentences were commuted by President Jimmy Carter.[2] All four returned to Puerto Rico.

Just wondered if that would change anyones view of the sentencing......

 

[durangodawood]

You mean like the Puerto Rican terrorists got for shooting up the House of Representatives?


The 1954 United States Capitol shooting was an attack on March 1, 1954, by four Puerto Rican nationalists who sought to promote the cause of Puerto Rico's independence from US rule. They fired 30 rounds from semi-automatic pistols onto the legislative floor from the Ladies' Gallery (a balcony for visitors) of the House of Representatives chamber within the United States Capitol.

The nationalists, identified as Lolita Lebrón, Rafael Cancel Miranda, Andres Figueroa Cordero, and Irvin Flores Rodríguez, unfurled a Puerto Rican flag and began shooting at Representatives in the 83rd Congress, who were debating an immigration bill. Five Representatives were wounded, one seriously, but all recovered. The assailants were arrested, tried successively in two federal courts and convicted. All received long consecutive sentences, amounting to life imprisonment. Wiki

Life in prison for them. Im ok with that.

 

[durangodawood]

BTW, I intentionally left this part out of the last paragraph: In 1978 and 1979, their sentences were commuted by President Jimmy Carter.[2] All four returned to Puerto Rico.

Just wondered if that would change anyones view of the sentencing......

I dont know why Carter commuted their sentences. I dont believe any president include all Ive voted for has a record of commutations that Id entirely agree with. Like Clinton and Mark Rich..... yikes.

 

[wing2000]

You mean like the Puerto Rican terrorists got for shooting up the House of Representatives?


The 1954 United States Capitol shooting was an attack on March 1, 1954, by four Puerto Rican nationalists who sought to promote the cause of Puerto Rico's independence from US rule. They fired 30 rounds from semi-automatic pistols onto the legislative floor from the Ladies' Gallery (a balcony for visitors) of the House of Representatives chamber within the United States Capitol.

The nationalists, identified as Lolita Lebrón, Rafael Cancel Miranda, Andres Figueroa Cordero, and Irvin Flores Rodríguez, unfurled a Puerto Rican flag and began shooting at Representatives in the 83rd Congress, who were debating an immigration bill. Five Representatives were wounded, one seriously, but all recovered. The assailants were arrested, tried successively in two federal courts and convicted. All received long consecutive sentences, amounting to life imprisonment. Wiki

If one is going to compare sentences, then this is a more viable comparison - i.e. convicted for the same charge seditious conspiracy: [it seems Carter commuted some of the sentences and later, Obama]

Among the last successful convictions for seditious conspiracy charges were in another, now largely forgotten storming of the Capitol building in 1954. Four pro-independence Puerto Rican activists rushed the building and opened fire on the House floor, wounding several representatives. They and more than a dozen others who assisted in the attack were convicted of seditious conspiracy.

Oscar Lopez Rivera, a former leader of a Puerto Rican independence group that orchestrated a bombing campaign that left dozens of people dead or maimed in the 1970s and 1980s, spent 35 years in prison for seditious conspiracy before President Barack Obama commuted his sentence in 2017.

What is seditious conspiracy? Rare, but now part of Jan. 6

Sedition, conspiracy. Those big words are now being used in Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol insurrection criminal cases after prosecutors charged 11 people Thursday.

apnews.com

 

[civilwarbuff]

I dont know why Carter commuted their sentences. I dont believe any president include all Ive voted for has a record of commutations that Id entirely agree with. Like Clinton and Mark Rich..... yikes.

So, not life in prison.....roughly 25 years. Oath Keepers idiot get 18 for "sedition".
With that in mind interesting short article: Notable sedition, treason cases in American history

 

[civilwarbuff]

Oscar Lopez Rivera, a former leader of a Puerto Rican independence group that orchestrated a bombing campaign that left dozens of people dead or maimed in the 1970s and 1980s, spent 35 years in prison for seditious conspiracy before President Barack Obama commuted his sentence in 2017.

Except he was not sentenced for just the HofR shooting: Oscar López Rivera (born January 6, 1943) is a Puerto Rican activist and militant who was a member and suspected leader[1] of the Fuerzas Armadas de Liberación Nacional Puertorriqueña (FALN), a clandestine paramilitary organization devoted to Puerto Rican independence that carried out more than 130 bomb attacks in the United States between 1974 and 1983.[1] López Rivera was tried by the United States government for seditious conspiracy, use of force to commit robbery, interstate transportation of firearms, and conspiracy to transport explosives with intent to destroy government property. Wiki

 

[durangodawood]

So, not life in prison.....roughly 25 years. Oath Keepers idiot get 18 for "sedition".
With that in mind interesting short article: Notable sedition, treason cases in American history

I said I agree with the life sentence handed out.

 

[civilwarbuff]

I said I agree with the life sentence handed out.

So if after the next election a Rep. president pardons this guy, you're OK with that?

 

[durangodawood]

So if after the next election a Rep. president pardons this guy, you're OK with that?

Nooo. I thought I expressed that I disagreed with Carter's pardon too. But this is all a quick take based on a few brief wiki quotes. The full story might paint a different picture..

 

[DaisyDay]

A lot of it can depend on the judge/prosecutor you're getting as well.

As noted in my previous post, there's a stark contrast in the sentencing patterns of the Jan 6th people depending on which DC federal judge their case landed with.

For just the misdemeanor cases, having your case heard by an Obama appointee was over twice as likely to receive jail time than having it heard by a Trump appointee. (53% to 19%)


And for the record, the inverse pattern existed with sentencing for people involved in BLM rioting.

In conservative red states (and under conservative judges and prosecutors), you had a lot more rioters getting jail time (and ranging from 6 months for things like vandalism to 7 years for arson charges), and in blue areas, rioters getting arrested for the same things, in many cases, got probation, or had prosecutors decline to charge and judges dismissing cases.

Given how polarized the political climate is, it's hard to find a "neutral court" for matters that are politically charged or tightly linked to a hot button political topic.

If one is committing political violence in the name of a "blue cause", they're more likely to get lighter treatment in California or New York than in Kentucky...and vice versa.

It just so happens to be that these Jan 6th people opted to commit their crimes in a jurisdiction where the US District Court is pretty stacked for the blue team.

So you're saying that justice is not equal in America? Gosh, who knew!

 

[Hans Blaster]

You mean like the Puerto Rican terrorists got for shooting up the House of Representatives?


The 1954 United States Capitol shooting was an attack on March 1, 1954, by four Puerto Rican nationalists who sought to promote the cause of Puerto Rico's independence from US rule. They fired 30 rounds from semi-automatic pistols onto the legislative floor from the Ladies' Gallery (a balcony for visitors) of the House of Representatives chamber within the United States Capitol.

The nationalists, identified as Lolita Lebrón, Rafael Cancel Miranda, Andres Figueroa Cordero, and Irvin Flores Rodríguez, unfurled a Puerto Rican flag and began shooting at Representatives in the 83rd Congress, who were debating an immigration bill. Five Representatives were wounded, one seriously, but all recovered. The assailants were arrested, tried successively in two federal courts and convicted. All received long consecutive sentences, amounting to life imprisonment. Wiki

Sounds like Rhodes is getting off easy then. He should be out before he's 75. No effective life sentence. Then again, his team left their weapons across the river until it was time for "phase 2", but that never came.

 

[civilwarbuff]

Sounds like Rhodes is getting off easy then. He should be out before he's 75. No effective life sentence. Then again, his team left their weapons across the river until it was time for "phase 2", but that never came.

Oh yeah, attempted murder should be handled slightly more severely than 'seditious conspiracy' (which will likely get thrown out on appeal).