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Notes -
January 6th agitator Ray Epps has pled guilty to one charge of disorderly conduct. The NYT story contains this sentence:
I'm not so sure about that. For those who haven't paid attention (a group that included myself until a discussion here a while back), Epps is on video repeatedly urging other members of the crowd to go into the Capitol. Many people have speculated that he was in fact some form of federal agent or informant. The fact that this is the legal outcome for him heightens, rather than lessens, my personal suspicion that he was working for the feds.
It is a very minor charge. Now granted, Epps did not enter the Capitol himself - but his open agitation of the attack nonetheless seems to me like it should constitute a significantly more serious offence, such as incitement to riot.
Speaking of which, it's very odd that he did not go into the Capitol himself, given that he loudly and repeatedly urged others to.
The fact that this minor charge plea deal has taken so long is very eyebrow raising as well. We typically saw the less serious cases dealt with quite quickly, while the big trials with serious jail time on the line took much longer - and even they got dealt with more quickly than Epps!
It's also extremely curious to me that they arranged a plea deal with Epps before he was ever charged with anything. That's not the normal way things go, as far as I'm aware - usually they throw everything they can at you, and then agree to drop some charges in exchange for guilty pleas for the others.
Now, it may be that there are matters of fact or law that I'm not aware of that makes all of this very normal and reasonable, and if so I would be delighted to be informed of them. But as it stands I am at a loss to explain how this guy is getting this treatment if he is not some kind of undercover operative.
EDIT: Thanks to @huadpe and @Gillitrut who have convinced me that the elements of more serious charges against Epps could probably not be satisfied.
You might want to add an additional edit reflecting that Huadpe's point got so demolished that he deleted his entire account and vanished from the site. Leaving up just your prior edit might give a misleading impression.
It's not clear to me from those arguments that the actual point that I'm interested in was in fact demolished - namely, whether or not evidence exists to prove more serious charges against Epps. I'm open to being persuaded back to my original position, though.
The charge I had in mind was incitement to riot - that seemed the clearest match to his actions. But I wasn't aware of how strict the SCOTUS precedent was on that.
What's the specific charge that you think could be proven against Epps? @Bleep seems to be gesturing towards conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding. Is that what you have in mind?
if he was being treated like other Jan6 people, he would have been raided and arrested 2 years ago, his electronics would have been seized 2 years ago, and he would get slapped with the full range of charges applied to others with conspiracy + felony obstruction, civil disorder, 1512(c)(2), seditious conspiracy, resisting/impeding cops, and a bunch of others, AND tack on assaulting a cop because there is enough evidence to support an initial charge given there is video of him holding a sign with a sign looking almost exactly the same later being used by a hard to distinguish hand to poke cops (you can see the standard applied to others by this US Atty Office by looking at the multiple people charged with allegedly using bear mace on a Capitol cop - they didn't need anything more than what is currently available with Epps to support that charge)
when it comes to other Jan6 defendants with a fraction of the publicly available evidence as Epps of their conduct that day and previous days, the US Atty Office under Matt Graves charged first and looked for evidence later, launched raids and seized all electronics, demanded pretrial detainment even for people with no criminal history and nonviolent charges, subjected them to horrid conditions in the DC gulag for years, and quite a bit else
The DOJ website has a list of "Capitol Breach Cases" and outside of non-conspiracy charges which require the person to be INSIDE the Capitol, a case can be made to charge Epps, and a case can be made for conspiracy to go in to the Capitol for those crimes. In my apparently deleted exchange with /u/huadpe, I go through some of the elements and the evidence against Epps using examples from other defendants to show we already have evidence to not only charge but convict Epps. I'm not going to go through a bunch of other charges and elements and list/link evidence. That's enough time and effort for it's own top-level post and not for a days old thread in an old post.
As far as I know, the DC US Atty's office hasn't charged anyone with incitement. Epps's conduct on video in Jan 5 and Jan 6 almost certainly fails the Brandenburg test. However, I'm not going to pretend that judges on the DC court or DC juries wouldn't allow it to proceed and convict if the US Atty office brought those charges even if they're very likely unconstitutional.
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First of all, I'd just like to say that I come squarely down on the side of "this dude is obviously a fed" - Huadpe's arguments were just utterly unconvincing when compared to the Revolver piece, and when he explicitly mentioned in one comment that he was angry over people trying to blame the government so they didn't have to blame Trump I just lost faith in his ability to be an honest interlocutor. Where's any attempt whatsoever to grapple with the fact that this supposed Trump supporter who claimed he went to Washington to hear Trump's speech missed Trump's speech because he was too busy telling people that they have to go into the Capitol? Why did he then send a text message about how he "orchestrated the movement of people into the Capitol"?
That does however put me in a slight bind when it comes to answering your question - I'm not sure exactly how he could face any actual charges without being able to proffer the defence "I did this because the government asked me too, and I was not trespassing or causing damage because I was authorised to do so by the federal government". But if we assume he isn't a fed and the DOJ just...forgot to charge him (I honestly can't even come up with a good excuse that also covers the removal from the most wanted list)? Then it turns out I'm actually lucky, and someone has already done my homework for me. Specifically Darren Beattie, who put up a nice twitter thread on the topic - https://twitter.com/DarrenJBeattie/status/1547396130513846275
From what I can see, his "when we go in" comment gets him done for conspiracy the same way George Tanios does, and I REALLY want to know what he was saying to PB Maroon (and who was that guy anyway) because it really looks like he was giving orders and organising the removal of barricades. I'm not sure I'd be able to convict with that footage, but I'd definitely be able to get a warrant for more information! He also goes into the restricted zone, but that's just icing on the top at this point. There are probably more charges that could be summoned up, but I'm not enough of a lawyer or prosecutor to figure out exactly what they would be. All I can do is compare his conduct to that of other people who were convicted, and so that's the standard that I use.
The guy is on video saying "The Capitol IS the Enemy." The guy's sermons are just ridiculous and only make sense in hindsight given what happened the next day. I've never seen anything remotely similar being said by others and it's such a goofball thing to say his fellow diehard MAGA/Trump supporters were weirded out and regularly called him a Fed and other names.
Given the mountain of publicly available evidence and how the guy fits a perfect caricature of how the government and their media mouthpieces wanted to portray Jan6 (an Oath Keeper leader on video making statements to go IN TO the Capitol which is OUR Enemy and fighting with cops), his wildly disparate treatment for 2.5 years is preposterous to me without an explanation that he was working for the fed gov in some capacity and acting on their behest in some capacity.
you wouldn't be on a DC jury
given what we've seen from DC juries and DC judges, if this was charged against other Jan6 defendants he would be convicted
I totally agree with you here, but I'd just like to point out that
I was assuming this would be from the perspective of a prosecutor... and I agree that they wouldn't let someone like me handle a case like this even if I was.
Ah, I understand now. This crystalized a point I was trying to make but you gave me words to organize it and do so concisely: To me, it's a waste of time/missing the point to engage in technical legal arguments about any particular charge, elements, or hair splitting about interpretations because what we see in the Jan6 cases is prosecutors, judges, and jurors in DC demonstrably do not care. I can give example after example after example of statutory interpretation stretched beyond their breaking point and historical precedent being tossed out the window in order to get "the bad guys."
Every argument which others have posted in defense of Jan6 prosecution or Epps's wildly disparate treatment has already been argued by decent lawyers in some Jan6 cases both in trial and before trial and almost all of the time these arguments were rejected. It's extremely black-pilling to me having spent years of my life in the legal field including in criminal defense to see these clownish showtrials in the Nation's capital.
And the saddest thing about it is these precedents, and lines, and laws weren't crossed and tossed to imprison Satan himself; they were tossed to destroy regular productive otherwise good (even if you disagree with their conduct and their politics here) people with no criminal history in their entire lives.
It's simply incredible to me that anyone continues to give these actors and this system the benefit of the doubt. Sorry for the rant.
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Thank you!
I don't agree that the "when we go in" comment constitutes proof of a conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding. The core of a conspiracy charge is that there is an agreement to commit a crime - and an agreement requires at least two parties. The person who he's speaking to in that clip doesn't seem to even acknowledge him, much less say anything that implies any sort of agreement.
This is a material difference with the Tanios case - Khater says "give me that bear shit", and Tanios says "not yet, it's still early". This exchange doesn't lay out in detail what the exact terms of their agreement were, but serves as clear evidence that they did have a shared plan that involved the use of "bear shit". If Tanios had not responded to Khater, not only would that exchange not implicate Tanios - it wouldn't implicate Khater either (even though Khater's behaviour would be identical).
That video where Epps appears to be giving orders about removing the barricades certainly looks suspicious and it's very possible that he said something that would prove conspiracy - if only it had been picked up by the mic. But it wasn't. All we have to go on is the testimony of the two men involved - and both Epps and Ryan Samsel - the guy he was speaking to - claim that Epps said "Relax, the cops are doing their jobs".
I absolutely agree that there's more than enough probable cause to secure a warrant and carry out further investigations (e.g. reading his communications, identifying other people in the video, asking them what Epps said and did, etc). My presumption is that the FBI would have done this (well, assuming they don't already know exactly what he was up to because he works for them). But it doesn't necessarily follow that the investigation would have turned up anything that could be used to convict him.
To be clear, I think Epps' behaviour was contemptible and I would very much like to see him punished more harshly - but you have to do it within the confines of the law and I don't see a way to nail him on stronger charges than the ones he got.
(I'm not particularly concerned about the removal from the most wanted list - his story is he called the FBI himself when he saw himself on it. As far as I can tell it seems like it's fair to take a guy off the wanted list when he calls you up and identifies himself. If nothing else it means you stop getting "tips" that you don't need.)
Did you read the revolver piece?
I'm sorry for not including it in my reply to you, because it was brought up and linked in an earlier comment I made, but it really does lay out the strongest form of the case against Epps that I've seen. There's not much point to me relitigating it when they've done all the homework for me.
https://revolver.news/2021/10/meet-ray-epps-the-fed-protected-provocateur-who-appears-to-have-led-the-very-first-1-6-attack-on-the-u-s-capitol/
https://revolver.news/2021/12/damning-new-details-massive-web-unindicted-operators-january-6/
https://revolver.news/2023/09/darren-beattie-ray-epps-misdemeanor-trespassing-charge-and-guilty-plea/
There's a lot there, but I don't think there's much point going through your claims here when these articles do a much better job of laying out the case in question. I'm sorry for not realising that I'd never actually linked you the piece - I got mixed up and I'd actually given the link to huadpe before he self-destructed.
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If that argument was confined to the courtroom, and resulted in a lighter sentence or acquittal, it would be one thing. I can't guarantee I'd be convinced (I'm biased towards conspiracy theories), but I would admit I have no way of arguing conspiracy over something mundane like "subtle difference in behavior, and smart lawyers who knew how to exploit it". The problem is we never even got to that point. It's absurd to believe that when law enforcement was hunting down people who weren't even present at the Capitol, and throwing every charge at them that they could think of, hiding exculpatory evidence, etc. etc., that they'd make an exception for this one guy for an innocent reason.
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The same ones that were thrown at the other J6 protesters?
It's really a shame he deleted his comments, he and Bleep really went into detail on it, and I don't see how you can make the case his treatment made any sense in the light of what happened to people who were convicted.
Which ones, specifically? Different people got charged with different things.
I believe the one that was being discussed was "conspiracy to use violent force", though I'm uncertain with half the conversation missing.
I can't find any examples of "conspiracy to use violent force" in this list of Jan 6 cases. I can't seem to find a statute referring to it either. Possibly though you might be able to point to a comparable offender to Epps among those cases?
Like I said, it's hard to tell now with hard the conversation missing. That was from a quote by huadpe himself, so presumably he had a reason to write it like that. Also there's a lot of "see documents" under that link.
Other charges that were discussed, like felony obstruction, and disorderly conduct seem to be there. They also discussed a video that could possibly have him charged with assault on a police officer.
He was charged with disorderly conduct.
As for "felony obstruction", are you referring to USC 1512(c)(2)?
I'm not aware of any video showing Epps committing assault, could you link me?
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Just as an aside, I'd like to post the strongest version of the "case" against Ray Epps that I've seen so far - which is the Revolver News breakdown. It raises questions that I don't think anyone in this thread has really answered or grappled with, especially all the things he was caught on camera doing and co-ordinating.
https://revolver.news/2021/10/meet-ray-epps-the-fed-protected-provocateur-who-appears-to-have-led-the-very-first-1-6-attack-on-the-u-s-capitol/
Number 2 doesn't make sense.
FBI is being ruthless in going after the Jan 6th crowd. Epps was dropped from the list of sought people by FBI.
Also, the provocateurs were allegedly ran by some naval Intel outfit, not the FBI.
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Did you not know these things? If so, why didn't you mention them in your first post when you were wondering how any other charges would be supportable? Why did you wait until others mentioned them to now bring up some video of Epps attempting near the end of his hour+ long agitation in restricted areas around the Capitol to de-escalate tensions between participants and cops?
this is quite an exaggeration to the point of caricature of what is required to to prove for any of the felony charges regularly being discussed from felony obstruction, to civil disorder, to 1512(c)(2) and others, based on interpretations already used to convict and sentence people to decades in prison
the "big conspiracy" could be a "wink or a nod" with a single other person and we have that in droves with Epps
and, in fact, other defendants who were charged with the above did present similar evidence of calming people down, telling people cops aren't the enemy, calmly walking with police, calmly leaving as soon as police asked them to leave, among other similar conduct (leaving aside for now the games the government has been playing this entire time to avoid giving people exonerating evidence, another difference we see between Epps and others)
and it meant a 1 hour deliberation instead of 30 minute deliberation
it did not mean a complete acquittal
and then the judge reads an instruction and the prosecutor assures the jury that literally nothing about Ray Epps attempting to calm down the crowd and defend cops later on exonerates his earlier conduct where he did plan to do X, Y, and Z, and there is video evidence showing he did do those things from being among the first to breach restricted grounds, to being in a crowd jeering with cops, to being in a crowd using flags similar to one he at one point was holding to spear cops attacking them, to him talking to people who then immediately breach the bike rack blockade on the west side of the Capitol, to him telling a fellow unidentified crowd member, "when we go in, leave that here, you don't want to get shot," to him interfering with law enforcement, to him being involved in multiple breach points, to him texting his son claiming credit for being involved in the debacle
your claim a DC jury would find complete acquittal because of this video is nonsense; in other cases with similar evidence of the defendant de-escalating tension, the most it meant was the jury not convicting on the most serious felony
and to pretend this speculated possibility would stop this DC US Atty office under Mathew Graves from bringing those charges given the abysmal conduct of his prosecutors in many of these cases is simply ridiculous
not to mention if we go by standards applied to other Jan6 defendants, it's not a sure thing the video would even be allowed without significant edits gimping its effect in defense
none of this is required to still believe Epps was "a fed" and is little more than another of your caricatures
So the choice of narratives is between a caricature or the simpler more reasonable sounding other choice? Hmm, I think I pick the reasonable one too given the framing. What now?
The way the State is treating Ray Epps is the way every single defendant should be treated by the legal system, but this is a testament to how disparate, illegal, and downright embarrassing the treatment of other Jan6 defendants and their show trials are to any person attempting to argue this is all above board and within the bounds of the law. It's either true, in which case "the law" is fundamentally broken, or it's not true and it's fundamentally broken.
then why didn't you mention any of them? because it's puzzling you wondering how any other charge could be brought when there is more evidence against Epps to bring charges than almost any other defendant, especially when your argument is basically 'yeah, there's plenty of evidence to bring charges, but there is also this mitigating factor which I think would make it difficult to get a conviction'
which reinforces what is necessary to prove and "big conspiracy" is not despite your insistence of it only in the context of seditious conspiracy despite this being regularly charged for felony obstruction, civil disobedience, and civil disorder
"when we go in, don't bring that, we don't want to get shot" is pretty similar to "no no not yet it's still early" for George Talios to support his conspiracy charge
even the video you think makes Epps conviction-proof, the guy admits to his planning to come to the Capitol and one could argue go IN to the capitol when he leads off, "We've done what we came here to do... "
first, let's acknowledge that the current publicly available evidence does show far more evidence in both content of the plan as well as far more than a "wink and a nod"
claiming more is required is simply wrong and the instruction you summarized at the start doesn't contradict that, so here you move the goalpost to it's theoretically possible, but no sane prosecutor would bring the case
which brings us to one of the defendants in the recent Proud Boys trial who was convicted of conspiracy to multiple charges with the judge allowing the prosecutor to make the statement that a "wink and a nod" did satisfy at least one of the elements to conspiracy which you admitted was theoretically possible but no sane prosecutor would bring that case except at the very least the prosecutor is communicating the baseline with the judge agreeing to it telling the jury what is required to prove
first, this isn't a discussion of only conspiracy to the sedition charges and also "seeking to overthrow the government" is specifically not required to prove the sedition charge
second, depending on the context of the trespass and statements describing that planned trespass, it can and has been argued by prosecutors in these Jan6 cases that this underlying "trespass" was meant to obstruct which was meant to commit behavior covered in the statute (again, "overthrow the government" is not necessary)
which is part of what was argued in the Proud Boys trial to support sedition charges
this is a pattern of your argument whereby you overexaggerate what is necessary to prove elements of a crime and then when it's pointed out what you're claiming is simply wrong, you move the goalpost to 'okay, that's technically/theoretically possible, but no sane prosecutor would do this' ignoring that in these specific cases that's what DC prosecutors have argued and done
which highlights the clownish and embarrassing show trials going on now brought by Matt Graves's US Atty office in Washington DC in front of DC district "judges" and DC jurors; it's honestly comical to compare the differences in amount of and substance to the evidence and behavior between this case and the cases against multiple Oath Keepers and Proud boys who have been convicted of the sedition charges
and if only any of motions for change of venue were granted, maybe we would get back somewhere closer to the norm, for example in the Michigan Governor Fednapping cases with half the defendants being acquitted (with another quarter of the defendants being subjected to a similarly clownish unfair 2nd trial after the first one had a single juror stopping an acquittal), but the DC Jan6 fiasco is not
in front of an Eastern District of Michigan jury and judges, maybe the video of Epps calming police would be enough of a mitigating and humanizing piece of evidence to give them pause for serious charges and serious time and it should ( although it definitely wouldn't make him conviction proof as you're attempting to claim), this is not an accurate reflection of Jan6 cases in front of DC judges and DC juries
again, this is not remotely required, and the sedition charge isn't the only available other charge which could be applied to Epps which you couldn't see a case for
For Epps to be working in concert with the government either as an informant or as an agent provocateur, examples of which can be seen all over the Michigan Governor Whitmer Fednapping trial. Nothing about this accusation requires Epps to be working in concert with or for only the FBI.
Not to mention, DOJ officials, Capitol police leadership, and others have already admitted to Congress that there were indeed many undercover agents and federal informants on the ground in Jan6 inside the demonstrations, with admissions in Court by the FBI itself that there were informants and people cooperating with the FBI specifically as well as a half dozen other government institutions in both the Oath Keepers and the Proud boys as well as other groups who made the trip.
Your attempt to portray this as ridiculous is perplexing because the FBI as well as a half-dozen other agencies have already admitted through testimony of leadership from the Capitol police, to the FBI, to the DOJ, to the intelligence community, to have exactly the sort of things on the ground which Epps is being accused of being. Epps served as the original example in order to crack the narrative and get independent media and people to pressure politicians to start digging revealing all of the above. The response has been to lock down any transparency and prohibit the state from admitting to details and instead pushing out very carefully worded statements with respect to Epps and then flat-out refusal to take questions or comment further.
The proud boys trial itself was a comical farce whereby Judge Kelly repeatedly sought to protect FBI and other government informants working inside the Proud Boys from scrutiny or admitting details of this substantial operation to the point where he forced the Proud Boys' defense attorneys to pre-clear cross-examination questions with the prosecution in the cases!
Do you just not know any of this? Or is this another example of you knowing these things but going through the performance of expressing incredulity about it until others bring it up?
This demand strikes me as very disingenuous. A member of the public will not be able to give you direct evidence of anything a law enforcement agency did undercover, unless official documents on the matter are entered into the public record. Since he was not given full access to the FBI's documents and communications, you have no right to make such a demand of him.
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if you accept Epps as a fed, then the direct evidence we have that a "fed" was "controlling the crowd" was dozens of minutes of video evidence of Epps attempting to control the crowd, a video of Epps saying something to someone who shortly afterwards breaches the west barricade, a video of Epps talking to another individual described by most as maroon-crowd boy who was an active participant in the breach as well
and then the individuals in the crowd breach initial barricades and the crowd itself goes IN TO the Capitol where "our problem is," which was the motivational sermon heard by Epps on video for which "I probably shouldn't say this because I'll probably be arrested... "
if Epps is a Fed, it opens the whole thing up as a fed operation complete with small groups of agitators who initially breach the grounds and the Capitol, larger groups of people who are simply wandering around through open doors without cops telling them to leave or that they're doing anything wrong, and an intentionally relaxed security situation by design by Capitol leadership (something which is detailed by the former Capitol PD Chief). Your entire argument has to be that Epps isn't a Fed because the evidence is pretty shocking if he is which explains the lockdown by the Government and their regime mouthpieces in the press to defend him. You want "direct evidence" which likely means the government essentially admitting he's a fed, but the government has locked down any investigation into the operation and DC judges have gone so far as to prohibit entirely relevant cross-examination of feds and the fed operation which would discover this fact. It happened in Michigan because of some freak accident and a judge who initially played ball with totally legitimate defense evidence requests.
What is undeniable is the guy is treated wildly different than similarly situated Jan6 participants. What is undeniable is there were feds on the ground that day, a fact already admitted by leadership of multiple agencies. Your claim other charges aren't supportable is simply nonsense for all the reasons I've outlined.
this topic deserves multiple top-level effort posts and perhaps I'll write one of them, but your arguments about Epps, Jan6 defendants, Jan6 itself, and the laws around it are weak, and hopefully I've provided better arguments as to why
edit: /u/huadpe blocked me for this exchange
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There are fingerprints all over the trials against the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers where the judges in those cases acted to protect multiple fed informants and agents who were on the ground that day. It got to the point that "judge" Kelly in the Proud Boys trial forced defense counsel to pre-clear questions with the prosecution in order to protect all the federal involvement in their group and on the ground that day. The highlights of that trial really are a marvel ( included an FBI agent admitting she deleted evidence with Kelly immediately sending the jury out) and should make a serious dent in any person's belief that these trials are little more than show trials, let alone remotely fair or objective.
The FBI, DOJ, Capitol Hill Police leadership have all admitted to there being significant government connected people, i.e., "feds" on the ground and in these groups.
the full scale of the Michigan operation was a secret and was only revealed because one of the FBI agents involved beat the crap out of his wife and was pulled over by police which lead to a whole lot of work by very clever defense attorneys which kept peeling back layers and finding more feds
this isn't an easy thing to do; there were no "whistleblowers" despite you claiming there should be involved people saying "wtf" and saving conversations, there were actually people who were telling their informants and other agents to delete evidence (thankfully, they were incompetent)
in DC, the "judges" got around this issue by simply blocking evidence requests or making excuses for the fed prosecutors failing to turn over evidence to defense attorneys despite repeatedly requests as well as excusing conveniently missing evidence, text messages, chats, etc.
and not only did no careers get ended but the head of the field office was promoted to DC, worked there during the Jan6 debacle, and recently left to work at one of the big 4 accounting firms as scrutiny escalated
your portrayal of the Michigan case is simply wrong and evidences a real lack of knowledge in how these things are discovered and unwound; it should serve as an example against your biases, but you somehow think it reinforces them
this is the new goalpost? okay, okay, maybe Epps was in fact a fed (the entire topic of this string of discussion), but unless I have direct evidence Ray Epps "controlled the crowd" (whatever that means), then it doesn't actually matter?
no thanks, I think I'll stop here before I get whiplash from the next galloping goalpost
edit: /u/huadpe blocked me for this exchange
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Thing is, this also describes pretty well everyone else involved -- with the exception of those who didn't even show up on the property for probably similar reasons. And it hasn't stopped any of them from being handed multi-decadal sentences.
so like a former leader of the Arizona Oath Keepers who did have people on Capitol grounds with evidence of preplanning?
one who is on video for days before the event telling people to go IN to the Capitol because that's where "our" problem is?
one whose reaction to being called a fed is to go to a slightly different area and continue his sermon about how necessary it was for people to go IN TO the Capitol? one who did this at least multiple times with multiple different crowds in the Jan 5 impromptu demonstration?
one who prefaces his sermons with "I probably shouldn't say this because I'll probably be arrested"?
So like a a guy holding a red Trump flagpole which is later seen to be poking capitol cops? the exact sort of behavior which is described by the media and the DC US atty office as "assault" with "a weapon"?
Every time in these comments you've attempted to differentiate the other Jan6
victimsdefendants, you reveal just how different Epps's treatment has been for reasons we are left to speculate about.Did you not know all these things about Epps? If not, don't you wonder why whatever sources you're using to form your opinions didn't bother to mention them? What other stuff are they leaving out of your coverage of Jan6 or the persecution of the poor saps caught in the web? If so, why didn't you mention this in any of your comments? Whenever anyone brings up these rather startling facts supported by quite a bit of publicly available, on video, evidence supporting felony indictments and treatment similar to many others, they don't affect your opinion at all and you just roll on with the same opinion. What are we to make of that?
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Let's just say 'much longer than Epps' then, rather than nitpicking the details. More or less everyone who gained access to the Capitol found themselves a dog who's caught the car, and just sort of milled around prior to leaving peacefully. Some of these people have been convicted and sentenced quite harshly -- and of course for the Proud-Boys et al who weren't even on site, whatever planning they had engaged came to fuck all in practice -- Epps is on video doing something like 'planning', so it seems like similar legal theories could apply to him if the charging authorities so desired.
Whether he is in fact a Fed or just 'not specifically a member of a group that the Feds would like to target', the inconsistent judicial behaviour is very banana republicy IMO.
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he's on video talking into Samsel's? ear who then immediately starts removing barriers to open up a pathway to the Capitol
he's on video talking to maroon crowd-boy making the statement, "when we go in, leave this here, you don't want to get shot" and that individual did indeed go into the Capitol being one of the most active participants in the event (strangely, he has not been identified or found)
he sent a text to his son claiming responsibility for orchestrating at least part of the demonstration going into the capitol after the event
he's on video in a crowd holding a trump sign which shortly afterwards surged forward pushing police aside; conduct which has been used by the DOJ as evidence of "force" in other Jan6 defendant cases
he's on video holding a trump sign when shortly afterwards there is video from another angle of, at the very least, a closely resembling sign being used to poke cops who were attacking the crowd
there is more publicly available evidence found by independent media to support felony charges against Epps than almost any other defendant who have been charged and convicted with some already serving(ed) their sentence
it's a "weird case" because of the sheer amount of publicly available evidence against Ray Epps who may as well be The Poster Boy of what the government and their mouthpieces in the media concocted as the narrative for the Jan6 debacle (a Oath Keeper militia member on video making states which could easily be sold as provoking "force" if not violence), and despite that , the FBI removed him from publicity when identified by independent media, no arrest or seizure of electronic devices or seemingly anything at all which was the typical treatment of other Jan6 defendants, even ones who were knowingly represented, the government did their best to pretend Epps didn't exist afterwards, and then the Narrative pushers did their best to defend them, and then mouthpieces in the media tried to whitewash it
and each time the DOJ and the government hoped it would be enough and enough people would be satisfied so they could drop it
so 2.5 years after the event with enough people refusing to drop it, Epps gets a misdemeanor charge by information with a plea deal hearing already on the calendar, and a ready NYT article proclaiming he's being held accountable and this like totally proves he's not connected to the government, and I guess we're supposed to be satisfied now at step 8 of the "do something, lean on our authority and institution lovers to pass this off as normal and fine, hope people drop it"
this is comical
I've seen some high-effort posts on this topic but I haven't seen a single person take all the actual evidence against Epps seriously, thank you for making this explicit.
This isn't to say other exonerating evidence or evidence which makes Epps look better doesn't exist or that a successful defense on the merits isn't possible (if we're going to entertain the fiction that the DC court system isn't laughably biased and incapable of giving Jan6 defendants a fair trial) , but it also existed for a thousand+ other people who are Jan6 defendants (more being added regularly) and yet that exonerating evidence is actively hidden by the state. There are people who have served their entire sentences only to find out when they're released from the pen that dozens of minutes of exonerating evidence was never given to them for their cases.
But not with Epps! The government didn't stop to collect all the evidence with everyone else (seriously, they claim this as the excuse for why they didn't hand over exonerating evidence to charged defendants attempting to appeal their cases) , but when it comes to Epps, geez, they have to work slowly and deliberatively and give him every benefit of the doubt. As far as I know, Epps is the only person who was interviewed by the DOJ before he was charged and the only person whose side of the story that day is even used in the pushed narrative at the time or even now.
When it comes to Epps, well by golly gosh, the government is ready to rush to his defense! The corporate media is ready to rush to his defense! The laughable joke that was the Jan 6 committee was ready to rush to his defense to engage in a performance of obviously scripted exchanges with parts somehow finding a way to corporate press so there could be ready articles in the NYT and other places proclaiming everything is just fine, this is all normal, please let go of this Epps thing.
He gets 2.5 years of time, soft-ball interviews with mass corporate media, obviously leaked information in "closed door" meetings to media mouthpieces, a former Perkins Couie lawyer to defend him, and a misdemeanor charge by information with a ready set plea deal hearing a couple days later, another ready NYT article proclaiming he is being held accountable and definitely not a fed and please let this go or you're a bad conspiracy theorist person, and this all happens a month before Ryan Samsel (the guy he talked into his ear) and another guy related but I forget his name are put on trial ?
As far as I can tell, there is one other person who was charged by information with a basic 1752(a)(2) misdemeanor charge and that person is Isaiah Giddings, a member of the Proud Boys who is also widely suspected of being connected to the government. Evidence against Giddings is tiny in comparison to Epps.
Few, if any, other Jan6 defendants were given this treatment. We're all just left to speculate why and told to ignore our lying eyes because this is all so normal, totally legal, and part of the process.
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Is that level of specificity required? IIRC, not a whole lot is needed to show agreement. This says:
BTW, I am not opining one way or the other re his guilt. I am merely commenting on the applicable law.
I don't know enough about the facts to opine on his guilt, but I do know that there is no requirement that a particular defendant do anything. United States v. Gonzalez, 797 F. 2d 915 (10th Circuit 1986) ["Once any conspirator commits such an overt act, the crime of conspiracy is complete."]
Oh, sorry I overlooked that. I should not be engaging online while in work meetings, I guess, regardless of how boring the meeting is.
Yikes, that sucks. Hope you feel better.
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Just a quick question on obstruction of official proceedings, does the attempt have to be successful? If I wanted to obstruct the UAP hearings and try to do so by pulling fire alarms or something with a bunch of people that have the same goal and plan, is that sedition even if no one actually stops the proceedings? What happens if they just call a recess instead of adjourning?
The reason I ask is that from my pov the proceedings seem to have been delayed because of the protest or riots, and members of Congress clearly feared for their safety. There wasn’t any violence within the building, but it seems like there might have been intent had there been an appropriate target for the crowd’s anger.
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Every time I’ve read the law for sedition leaves me with no idea how the law is constitutional. My reading it always comes up with just about anything qualifies as sedition. Oppose any law by force sounds like conspiracy. Therefore the law seems excessively broad and unconstitutional. Otherwise we should have a few 100k getting charged with this per year.
I guess writing law is hard. It’s tough to right something that applies to everything you want it to without being 5k pages of footnotes.
Here is what I find googling on “force”. Maybe it’s not exactly what is meant.
“Power, violence, compulsion, or constraint exerted upon or against a person or thing. Power dynamically considered, that is, in motion or in action; constraining power, compulsion; strength directed to an end. Commonly the word occurs in such connections as to show that unlawful or wrongful action is meant, e.g., forcible entry.“
Commonly the words occurs in such connections as to show that unlawful or wrongful action is meant
Which would seem to bring the Kavanaugh case in play. It’s illegal to block the entrance to the Kavanaugh hearings.
What does that matter? Can a different prosecutor or judge have a different meaning?
I can’t read this in my understanding of English and find it not stretchable or changeable depending on whose in power.
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https://news.yahoo.com/news/brett-kavanaugh-protesters-ignore-police-194043428.html
This seemed like force was used. And obstructing a proceedings.
And I’m not sure what law you need to violate but something like punching a cop in a bar fight seems like it could qualify.
Or assaulting Rand Paul in the Capitol I would think violates some law.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8672681/BLM-protesters-gather-outside-White-House-Trumps-RNC-speech.html
And assaulting the federal building in Portland.
https://thepostmillennial.com/watch-antifa-attacks-sets-fire-to-federal-courthouse-in-portland
But none of these were charged under this statute. I believe sedition meaning is to overthrow the government and the purpose of the statute but it’s not written that specifically.
Here is the actual text I am finding
“If two or more persons in any State or Territory, or in any place subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, conspire to overthrow, put down, or to destroy by force the Government of the United States, or to levy war against them, or to oppose by force the authority thereof, or by force to prevent, hinder, or delay the execution of any law of the United States, or by force to seize, take, or possess any property of the United States contrary to the authority thereof, they shall each be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than twenty years, or both.“
“Or oppose by force the authority thereof”
“Or by force to prevent, hinder, or delay the execution of any law”
I still think is in play. I can’t find a good legal definition of “force”
They hit a cop protecting Paul. So force was used. And I’m sure hitting a federal cop protecting a senator breaks a federal law. The only thing lacking is preplanning. That just means they didn’t investigate or decide to put informants into BLM because they are “good people”
Again just sounds like laziness not to investigate. Plus if something happens 30 days in a row do you really need to prove pre-planning. If me and my buddies did something 7 days in a row and it happens day 8 I think you know we planned on during the same thing day 8.
I honestly don’t know how Kamela Harris isn’t guilty of violating this act. She set up a bail fund to bail out violent protestors. So preplanning exists. The rest would just be finding specific instances.
Also oppose by force the “authority” seems like it can do a lot of weight.
This just feels like a who/whom case and the regime doesn’t like Proud Boys so they use the statute.
I don’t care what the court said. That’s one judges interpretation in this case. Is the term squishy? For example in the Kavanaugh case from a physics standpoint they applied a “force” to the barricade to move it. And that’s beyond looking and seeing if anyone touched an officer or if blocking entrance could be construed as force. I am challenging the law itself not whether the jury properly followed the jury instruction from this particular judge.
The law in question uses a phrase “authority” which could be broadly construed.
If a thousand people showed up to Kavanaughs hearing I guarantee there was an organizer. Same thing with nightly attacks on Portland I guarantee someone was organizing plans.
Bail funds itself is not a use of a force. But it does show that she was working with people who were committing violent protest acts. And in communications with them. Someone on her team was talking to the violent protestors and asking so whose your people doing this.
This feels like your argument is a lot like an economists saying assume a can opener but yours is assume the judges narrow definition is correct. That’s a big assumption.
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Quick question - would removing barricades count here? Say someone took down police barricades in a non-destructive way, just disassembled them. Would that qualify as destroying property? None of the components of the barrier were destroyed, just moved so that they failed to actually block the movement of people.
I was asking more specifically - would removing or simply moving a fence count as destruction? I'm legitimately unsure as to whether taking down a temporary fence counts as destruction, because you're technically removing the barrier but you're not actually destroying any property.
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I appreciate this post a lot. I agree, for the reasons you state, that Epps is probably not guilty of obstructing an official proceeding or of seditious conspiracy. I am somewhat mollified about the fact that he did his plea deal prior to getting charged - having other examples helps.
It remains unclear to me why he was not charged with inciting a riot, or why his allegedly low level offence was not dealt with long ago.
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Why would Ray Epps need to meet these standards? The government charged dozens of protesters with less for more. They prosecuted independent journalists, they prosecuted people who weren't even there. If the government is trying to prove that the Jan. 6 protesters were "opposing the authority of the Government by force" to "delay the execution of of any law of the United States," shouldn't they charge the guy literally inciting people to go into the building?
Or is it likelier that this is related to Merrick Garland's admission that DOJ lost count of how many informants they had at the Capitol that day? -- i.e., we know they had informants there and it's incredibly likely that Ray Epps is one of them. Why after all would it bother you if he was? Why do you feel the need to defend him?
Not being there is not necessarily a defense. Charles Manson wasn't there when the Tate/La Bianca murders took place. Nor was Khalid Sheikh Mohammed on any of the planes on 9/11.
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IANAL but it seems like 18 USC 2101 could be appropriate. Although 18 USC 2102(b) provides:
So it probably depends pretty specifically on what Epps said and what the feds could convince a jury of. Was Epps urging or instigating others to commit or threaten violence? Or was he merely advocating an idea or expressing a belief that didn't necessarily entail violent acts?
The article notes there were a few others who went to the Capitol but didn't go inside. Do we have any information on what they were charged with? Might be a useful point of comparison.
Also the article you linked to references another NYT article from yesterday, when the charging was originally announced, and says:
I almost wonder if the FBI considered his conduct too minor to charge in summer 2021 and maybe lost track of his case in the interim since he wasn't on their list anymore? Then, Epps was back in the news with his interview and lawsuit so they decided they should get around to charging him? Given the harassment it sounds like he faced maybe he wanted to be charged to try and put rumors of his being a fed to bed? I might rather spend some time in jail or on probation than be inundated with conspiracy theory driven death threats!
He specifically said he wanted people to do things they could get arrested for because "it's right" no ? Pretty sure that is, by definition, incitement to criminal activity no?
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Ah yeah. That is indeed a hard test to meet.
Okay, I'm putting my pitchfork away. Still weird that it took so long for him to get charged, but that's not weird enough to suggest "federal plant" to me anymore.
Why would the DOJ need to cover their ass if he wasn't a stooge? People get called snitches all the time, I can't find any other examples of the DOJ even feeling the need to respond to claims of that nature, let alone prosecute.
especially 2.5 years after the fact when they know no one who thinks he's connected to the government is going to have their minds changed by this behavior
my speculation is that there are two high-ish profile cases (Ryan Samsel and another I cannot immediately recall) going to trial in the next month with Epps being a direct witness in those cases and the defendants in those cases are now changing their stories w/re to Epps and what happened and the gov may need to use him to go after those people
if there was no plea deal, Epps has a strong case for refusing to testify by invoking his Constitutional rights, so by golly gosh, it just so happens a charge by information on a single misdemeanor count with a plea deal hearing scheduled a few days later just popped up
my additional less supportable speculation is that those defendants have played ball somewhat with the government and now that they're realizing the government is still coming after them seemingly without any limit, they've decided to stop playing ball and changed their stories and will claim it was because of government threats, again with Epps being a direct subject
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I think shouting "We need to go into the Capitol!" qualifies as "urging or instigating other persons to riot" for the purposes of 18 USC 2101, yes. He's advocating an action, not merely discussing ideas or expressing a belief. In one case he even says "I don't even like to say it, because I'll be arrested" immediately beforehand! Unless I'm misunderstanding the law in some important way, you really can't get a clearer admission of guilt.
Predicting you'll be arrested is not generally admission of guilt to a crime. You can be wrong, after all! Also note how Epps caveats his comments with "peacefully" immediately after the "We need to go into the Capitol" part. 18 USC 2102(a) requires the riot in question involve violence or threats of violence. Calling for entering the Capitol peacefully would seem to be the opposite of that. I've never been a federal prosecutor but I wouldn't love bringing charges under 18 USC 2101 just on the basis of what's in the video. As @huadpe notes in a parallel comment the speech would also have to pass the test from Brandenburg v. Ohio (and apparently nobody has been charged with incitement). I am not sure speech the previous night for violence the following day is sufficiently "imminent" under Brandenburg.
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It reminds me a lot of the Hunter Biden plea deal which had terms that could have included any bribery or foreign agent type charges.
Or Clapper and Brennan getting new fancy government titles after leading the laptop misinformation campaign. Who if they were not part of the regime probably lied to congress in the past and if they were a Trumper would have been charged.
At this point I wouldn’t be surprised of anything. Perhaps Jan 6 was just the CIA organizing a false color Revolution with some useful idiots.
At some point it just feels like they are rubbing things in our faces with their corruption.
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So people who weren't even there get felonies for sedition, people who were there get felonies for not just trespassing but interfering with an official proceeding, and this one guy gets a disorderly conduct plea? This is not going to make anyone who believes he was a Fed believe he was not a Fed.
No. But it allows the NYT, “the paper of record”, to publish:
No doubt the DoJ or some other government organ explicitly directed them to publish this. We just saw last week that this is exactly how it works. No doubt some federal official will now quote the NYT saying that this clears up the Epps saga. It’s the same playbook from the Iraq War, Russiagate, and I’m sure many other examples.
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there are hundreds of people being charged or having been charged. there are bound to be some cases which deviate from the norm in terms of sentencing, duration of trial, etc.
In this case, people were highlighting him over nine months ago, and I think there was one or two predicting this particular prat would get either no charges or a cushy deal back before the move from reddit.
There are some plausible innocent explanations -- this story is about a judge complaining that the DoJ was being too lenient with sentencing requests of other people, albeit none who'd been as high-profile, and Epps genuinely has been extremely cooperative with progressive efforts since -- but random chance isn't really one. And those kinder explanations are hard to isolate from less good ones with the available information.
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Sure - but there's reasons why. Someone makes a choice about who gets charged with what. They don't just pick a crime out of a barrel.
Jan 6th was a major incident, and the DoJ has come down on the perpetrators like a pile of bricks. They've been especially harsh on the people who helped orchestrate it, like Tarrio. And that's good! They deserved it! But in the midst of that, you have this guy on camera telling people "Tomorrow, we go into the Capitol" and he gets a slap on the wrist? What?
Please, if you can think of an alternative explanation, share it.
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Doesn't this also look a lot like what you would expect for an after-the-fact informant? That would be my most likely guess in a vacuum.
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He also was listed as one of the top people wanted by the FBI until they quietly took it down. So going from most wanted to a barely misdemeanor smells fishy.
My default now is to assume the FBI is actually extremely incompetent. Therefore, if they proceeded to charge this guy, they would've had to reveal some embarrassing mistake made in investigating him so they're choosing to instead let him off with a wrist slap.
He was on their top 30 sought list at number 16, and when the Revolver published their article they removed him from the list.
They aren't incompetent, he probably just wasn't theirs and the operation was only kinda covered up by the FBI, but ran by some other spooks.
EDIT: I'm also pissed how searches go. Epps story was broken by Revolver. Try searching for 'Epps revolver list'. On duckduckgo, the search result I meant was 20 results down. On Yandex, right on the top. I guess it goes without saying that Google is messing with it.
For those search terms the Revolver article is #3 on Kagi, which isn’t plausibly boosting conspiracy theory adjacent content.
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Your default should be that they are extremely corrupt and partisan. Lawyers for the FBI straight up falsified documents for the FISA court. FBI officials were literally despairing their main squeeze hilldawg was robbed of her presidency and were conspiring to nail Trump for literally anything they could try and think of. Including wiretaping the god damned sitting president of the united states and trying to entrap his underlings.
The demographics suggest it shouldn't be completely partisan, but I'm guessing the leadership is, and enough rank and file are so it can behave in a nakedly partisan manner.
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The bar for being most wanted by the FBI or put on a most wanted list is surprisingly low. There are many categories too
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This really, really looks like a figleaf that they're putting on to say "hey, this guy isn't a fed!"
Maybe there's more to the matter, but I'm not paying any money to find out.
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