1/6 Insurrection Investigation

[Rick Plant]

Feds to seek 10-year prison sentence in Jan 6 case of Chris Alberts, arguing he was "wearing metal-plated body armor.. carrying a concealed, fully loaded firearm (containing hollow point.. rounds), gas mask, throat mic, binoculars, bungee cords.. fully loaded ammunition magazine".

[Rick Plant]

The newest wave of Jan 6 criminal cases continues to grow.

Court has unsealed case against Joshua Coker of Toledo, Ohio.

Charging documents allege Coker was inside Senate Chamber, while amid the mob.

[Rick Plant]

Special Counsel Probes Team Trump’s Jan. 6 ‘War Room’

The special counsel's investigators are grilling Trump's allies about a series of meetings at the Willard Hotel ahead of Jan. 6, sources tell Rolling Stone



IN THE DAYS and hours before the Jan. 6 Capitol attack, diehard Donald Trump allies gathered at Washington’s Willard Hotel, hunkered down as the last-ditch efforts to overturn the 2020 election went forward. What exactly they were doing in those meetings was a subject of intense interest for Congress’ Jan. 6 investigation, but the committee ran into the limits of its powers as it struggled to reconstruct the specifics of those eleventh-hour meetings.

Now, special counsel Jack Smith’s office is taking its shot, hoping to figure out exactly what went down in the Willard “war room” — and just how involved Trump himself was in the Willard-based efforts to stop the transfer of power to then president-elect Joe Biden.

Special counsel investigators are grilling witnesses about the crucial Willard meetings, two people with knowledge of the investigation tell Rolling Stone. It could prove to be a fruitful line of questioning. One former senior Trump administration official, who stayed on through the Jan. 6 riot, simply refers to it as “the crime headquarters.”

The Willard, a luxury hotel a block from the White House, became the site of what participants described as a “war room” for Trump-aligned lawyers and diehard MAGA operatives working to overturn the 2020 election. The summit took place in the days and hours before the certification of electoral college votes on Jan. 6, and participants included Trump advisers and allies such as Giuliani, John Eastman, Bernard Kerik, Boris Epshteyn, and Steve Bannon.

Investigators led by special counsel Jack Smith have questioned multiple witnesses — including then-top Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani — about the timeline and deliberations of the meetings, seeking to reconstruct the events, the sources say. The investigators also plan to bring in additional witnesses who have knowledge of the Willard meetings, the sources add.

The federal investigators are also focused on the level of Trump’s direct involvement in the meetings, the sources say. The then-president reportedly called Rudy Giuliani on Jan. 5 to complain about Vice President Mike Pence’s refusal to go along with a plan to block the counting of legitimate electoral college votes, according to interviews conducted by the Jan. 6 Committee.

The special counsel’s office declined to comment on this story. But Smith’s interest in Trump associates’ activities at the Willard Hotel, where the then-president’s lieutenants reportedly oversaw the effort to disrupt the count of legitimate electoral college votes, suggests the special counsel is exploring Trump’s role in and knowledge of the efforts to disrupt the proceedings.

Early this week, the former president was sent a target letter related to this investigation, strongly suggesting that an indictment — Trump’s third of the year — could be coming soon. The letter listed the federal statutes under which Trump is expected to be charged, including conspiracy, obstruction, and civil rights violations.

Smith’s office’s efforts to reconstruct what occurred at the Willard during the tumultuous Trump-Biden presidential transition could address questions left unanswered by Congress’ wide-ranging investigation into Trump and his associates.

The January 6 House committee interviewed a number of Trump allies in attendance about the Willard “war room,” including Giuliani and Kerik. But others, including Trumpist attorney Eastman, invoked their Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination when asked even basic questions about whether they were in attendance at the Trump “war room” in early Jan. 2021.

“We didn’t get to peek behind the curtain there because they stonewalled us,” a former Jan. 6 committee staffer tells Rolling Stone in reference to the Willard investigation.

The House committee also focused on the phone call Trump apparently made to deputies at the hotel the day before the insurrection.

During Giuliani’s interview with the January 6 House committee, investigators asked about a phone call which they said took place between Trump, Giuliani, and Bannon at the hotel. Trump, one investigator said during Giuliani’s deposition, “called you and Mr. Steve Bannon and conveyed to you that the Vice President was very arrogant and that the President wasn’t happy with him,” according to transcripts released by Congress.

Giuliani, citing attorney-client privilege issues, declined to describe the substance of his call with the former president.

The Trump “war room” at the hotel was a subject of particular interest for the committee’s investigation for its role as a hub for the Trump campaign’s attempts to block the counting of electoral votes on January 6. Top Trump advisers used the so-called “command center” while pressuring Vice President Mike Pence to reject the counting of legitimate electoral votes and encourage state legislatures to instead send slates of bogus pro-Trump electors in battleground states where the former president had lost to Joe Biden.

In a sign that the fake electors plot could be a key part of the Smith investigation, the special counsel’s office has issued subpoenas to election officials in Arizona, Michigan, and Wisconsin seeking information about the activities of the Trump campaign.

Despite the “command center’s” importance in Trump’s attempted coup, during the presidential transition, the Willard hub attracted the private ire of other Trump advisers who were quietly embarrassed by Giuliani and others’ efforts. Other members of the administration and Trump campaign advisers, the former official says, regularly mocked their work and had nicknames for the “Star Wars cantina” of 2020 dead-enders.

One former senior Trump campaign official tells Rolling Stone that, in discussions at the time with other Trump aides, they called the Willard hotspot “idiot island.”

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/trump-jan-6-jack-smith-willard-war-room-1234792827/



Trump State Department appointee found guilty of seven felonies in Jan. 6 case

Federico Klein had a bench trial before another Trump appointee



WASHINGTON — A Donald Trump political appointee who attempted to storm the Capitol on Jan. 6 was convicted of seven felonies Thursday, the same day a grand jury deciding whether to indict the former president for his efforts to stop the peaceful transfer of power was hearing testimony from former White House aide William Russell.

Federico Klein, who worked in the State Department during the Trump administration, was convicted by U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden, also a Trump appointee, after a bench trial that unfolded last week. Klein was represented by Stanley Woodward, an attorney for several former Trump officials, including Russell, who was testifying elsewhere in the federal courthouse. Klein, who was 42 at the time of his arrest, faced charges of assaulting, resisting or impeding officers; obstruction of an official proceeding; and civil disorder; as well as misdemeanor offenses.

Klein was originally set to go to trial alongside two other co-defendants, but one of the men — Christopher Quaglin — admitted his guilt. Klein instead went to trial alongside Steven Cappuccio, of Texas, who authorities said ripped off an officer’s mask and joined an effort to try to charge past law enforcement.

Klein was in a tunnel leading into the U.S. Capitol, where some of the worst violence against police took place on Jan. 6, 2021, prosecutors had argued. He did not enter the building, however.

During the trial, Woodward argued that it was in "the eye of the beholder" what Klein was doing in the tunnel. He acknowledged that Klein's presence at the front of the police line was not a factor in his favor but that the government had not proven Klein's intentions that day.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/trump-state-department-appointee-found-guilty-seven-felonies-jan-6-cas-rcna95194

[Rick Plant]

Trump faces possible indictment in Jan. 6 probe

Donald Trump is facing a possible indictment in the Justice Department's Jan. 6 investigation. The grand jury met Thursday in Washington, D.C. CBS News chief election and campaign correspondent Robert Costa joins "America Decides" to discuss the potential crimes Trump could be charged with.

Watch:

Legal experts: Trump can be convicted for Jan. 6 with what we already know

NBC News has confirmed that Donald Trump received a target letter in Special Prosecutor Jack Smith’s January 6th probe. Harvard Law Professor Laurence Tribe joins MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell to discuss that and a legal analysis by group of experts for Just Security stating Trump can be convicted with the evidence already publicly available.

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

Jan. 6 investigation closes in on Trump

Already facing criminal cases in New York and Florida, former President Donald Trump is in increasing legal peril as investigations into his efforts to cling to power after his election loss appear to be coming to a head. (July 20)

Watch:

Trump prepares for ‘Arrest and Indictment’ in Jan 6. probe

"There is just no way for a reasonable person with elementary critical thinking skills to deny the seriousness of this case. This is about a real and existential threat to our nation. It’s about Donald Trump’s attempt and his continuing attempts to undermine and possibly end our democracy as we know it,” says Ali Velshi, as Trump faces a potential third indictment in the Department of Justice’s investigation into efforts to interfere with the 2020 Presidential election – which led to the insurrection on Jan. 6.

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

'Better than Mark Meadows': Aide by Trump's side on Jan. 6 could be key Jack Smith witness

A little-known Donald Trump aide could provide a major boost to special counsel Jack Smith in his investigation of the former president’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election, a legal expert said Thursday.

Former federal prosecutor Andrew Weissmann said during an appearance on “Alex Wagner Tonight” that William Russell, who testified before Smith’s grand jury on Thursday, could provide Smith more details than some of the more high-profile witnesses.

Russell has remained in Trump’s orbit after serving as White House special assistant. He remained personal aide for Trump after the former president left office.

“William Russell really seems to know a lot about almost everything. So what was he doing with the grand jury today? And what can that tell us about where this whole investigation stands?” Wagner asked.

“It tells you it's at this point where I think we’re very much at the end stage, but to your point, he's that sort of natural person to make sure you’ve sort of gone through everything he knows because he is there with the former president day in and day out so in some ways, it's even better than Mark Meadows,” Weissman said.

“Plus he’s sort of a more junior person, so you might, ‘might’ I stress, get a more candid version of what happened.”

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

In newly charged Jan 6 case of Ben Shuler, feds allege Shuler at first denied to FBI that he was amid the mob at Capitol. Then he was confronted with photos.

Feds allege Shuler "resisted the police line & began pushing a (Montgomery County, MD) officer's riot shield several times".