Stewart Rhodes: Guilty

Stewart Rhodes, the founder of the rightwing Oath Keepers militia [who wears an eye patch after accidentally shooting himself in the face], has been found guilty of seditious conspiracy, a charge arising from the attack on the US Capitol by supporters of Donald Trump.

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In an eight-week trial, Rhodes, a Yale Law-educated former paratrooper and disbarred attorney, was accused with four associates of fomenting a plot to use force to stop Congress certifying Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory.

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Rhodes did not go inside the Capitol but was accused of leading the plot.

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US district judge, Amit Mehta, presided. The 12-member jury deliberated for three days.

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The rarely used, civil war-era charge calls for up to 20 years behind bars.

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Rhodes’ four co-defendants were Kelly Meggs, Kenneth Harrelson, Jessica Watkins and Thomas Caldwell.

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Meggs, Watkins and Harrelson entered the Capitol wearing tactical gear.

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Meggs was convicted of seditious conspiracy. Harrelson, Caldwell and Watkins were acquitted.

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Rhodes and two others [Watkins, a transgender woman who fled the US army, and Caldwell, a disabled navy veteran,] testified in their own defense. They denied plotting an attack or seeking to stop Congress certifying results. Rhodes insisted that his followers who went inside went rogue.

  The Guardian

I guess the jury didn't buy it.

Rhodes shot himself in the face and then in the foot, so to speak.

Caldwell, who like Rhodes did not enter the Capitol, never formally joined the Oath Keepers. He tried to downplay inflammatory texts he sent in connection with the attack, saying some of the lines were adapted from or inspired by movies such as The Princess Bride or cartoons such as Bugs Bunny.

Oh dear god. What is he, 12?

Four other Oath Keepers members charged with seditious conspiracy are due to go to trial in December. Members of another rightwing group, the Proud Boys, including its former chairman Enrique Tarrio, also are due for trial on seditious conspiracy charges in December.

I'm guessing they won't be having a very merry Christmas. And after Trump made it okay to say Merry Christmas again. Sad!

P.S.  Some interesting background on Rhodes.

UPDATE:

Oath Keepers trial

Jessica Watkins, a former bar owner in Ohio and an Army veteran, took the stand on Wednesday in a high-stakes trial charging Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes and four other militia members with the rarely used charge of seditious conspiracy.

Watkins, who has been locked up for two years following her arrest in the case, said she did not intend to stop certification of President Biden’s 2020 election victory when she stormed the Capitol in a military stack formation with other Oath Keepers.

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Watkins explained she was given a “steady diet” of conspiracy theories about the 2020 election from “Infowars” host Alex Jones.

  The Hill

Force fed, I guess.

Watkins, Rhodes and three other Oath Keeper members on trial face up to 20 years in prison if convicted on the seditious conspiracy charges. Closing arguments could begin as early as this week.

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When he took the stand, Rhodes also said it was “stupid” for Oath Keepers members to charge into the Capitol and repeated that he never meant to overturn certification of the 2020 election.

Rather, Rhodes said he and other militia members were awaiting orders from former President Trump to invoke an old series of laws known as the Insurrection Act, which allows the commander-in-chief to call up a militia to quell a domestic disturbance.

Then it follows that they created the disturbance in order to have Trump make the call. Which is, of course what the plan was, and Trump was in on it.

But Watkins on Wednesday said there was no plan to invoke the Insurrection Act.

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“There was talk of the Insurrection Act, but no one was taking it seriously."

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[Another Oath Keeper on trial, Thomas] Caldwell, a retired Navy intelligence officer, said he was not serious when he wrote messages to the militia group about ferrying “heavy weapons” across the Potomac River into Oath Keepers’ “waiting arms,” according to the AP.

Caldwell called those messages “creative writing.”

Sure.

At least Watkins and Caldwell - or their attorneys - understood Rhodes' admission they were waiting for the Insurrection Act call up was a bad mistake.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

First seditious conspiracy trial begins

Using text messages, video and recorded calls, the Justice Department is trying to persuade the jury at a federal courthouse in Washington, D.C., that [Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes and four other members] set out to overturn the results of the 2020 election by storming the Capitol and interrupting the count of electoral votes.

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Rhodes never entered the building on Jan. 6, 2021, but he was photographed on the Capitol grounds "surveying" his troops like a battlefield general, the government said. A couple of minutes before 14 people wearing military-style gear marched toward the building's doors and pushed past the police, Rhodes spoke with his fellow defendant Kelly Meggs.

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Lawyers for Rhodes asked the jury to keep an open mind and hold the government to its burden of proof. Attorney Phillip Linder said the Oath Keepers had traveled to Washington to provide security for events in early January 2021.

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Prosecutors had presented messages in which Rhodes wrote before Jan. 6: "We aren't getting through this without a civil war." And after Jan. 6, Rhodes allegedly said, "my only regret is that they should have brought rifles....we could have fixed it right then and there."

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"My client did nothing illegal that day, even though it may look inflammatory," [Rhodes attorney Phillip] Linder said, describing Rhodes' hot-tempered statements before and after Jan. 6 as "nothing more than free speech and bravado."

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After the assault, the defendants felt "elated," Assistant U.S. Attorney Nestler said, citing messages they shared boasting about their actions. Rhodes allegedly wrote, "you ain't seen nothing yet." Meggs, who ran the Florida chapter of the Oath Keepers, allegedly wrote, "we aren't quitting!! We are reloading!!"

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Defendant Thomas Caldwell wrote "I rolled with the Oath Keepers..... I said, let's storm the place and hang the traitors."

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Within a couple of days, the mood had turned, and Rhodes allegedly directed people to "delete your self incriminating comments or those that incriminate others."

  NPR

I guess the brilliant lawyer Rhodes didn't know you never really delete anything from the web.

Earlier Monday morning, Judge Amit Mehta denied a request by the defense to move the trial out of D.C., saying the three-day voir dire process had produced a 16-member jury with no bias against the defendants.

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Defense lawyer David Fischer, who represents defendant Thomas Caldwell, used his opening statement to blast the FBI for conducting what he considered a questionable investigation and misunderstanding military terms used by Caldwell, a disabled U.S. Navy veteran. In another instance, Fischer said, the FBI used statements to support its search of Caldwell's farm that actually came from the cult classic movie, The Princess Bride.

Does it matter where he got them?

Fischer also said the quick reaction force was a "break the glass in case of emergency" option the Oath Keepers had used at previous rallies in Ferguson, Mo., and in D.C., when Congress was not in session.

But they didn't "break the glass" except at the Capitol.

A lawyer for Watkins told jurors she is a transgender woman and "she's never felt like she's fit in."

What person who doesn't feel like they fit in doesn't attack the Capitol and the democracy?

Watkins turned herself in voluntarily and spoke with the FBI four times, not what someone trying to overthrow the government would do, Crisp said.

It's someone who's trying to save her own skin. 

I still wonder if they'll be able to connect and indict Roger Stone.

 ...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE:

They needed this info for the second impeachment

It might not have changed the vote enough to convict, but it would be in the record. Hopefully, the investigation into the coup attempt will be thorough.

Attorneys for Ohio Oath Keeper Jessica Watkins detail how the efforts among paramilitants who are now accused of conspiracy on January 6 were closer to the apparatus around then-President Donald Trump and his rally than was previously known.

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"On January 5 and 6, Ms. Watkins was present not as an insurrectionist, but to provide security to the speakers at the rally, to provide escort for the legislators and others to march to the Capitol as directed by the then-President, and to safely escort protestors away from the Capitol to their vehicles and cars at the conclusion of the protest," the court filing said on Saturday. "She was given a VIP pass to the rally. She met with Secret Service agents. She was within 50 feet of the stage during the rally to provide security for the speakers. At the time the Capitol was breached, she was still at the site of the initial rally where she had provided security."

"To carry out its protective functions on January 6th, the U.S. Secret Service relied on the assistance of various government partners. Any assertion that the Secret Service employed private citizens to perform those functions is false," a US Secret Service spokesperson said in a statement to CNN on Sunday.

  CNN

Did she say she was paid?

Watkins is central to one of the most aggressive criminal conspiracy cases yet to emerge from the insurrection. The Justice Department indicted her and eight other alleged Oath Keepers on several charges related to the riot, including allegations that the group coordinated their travel to the pro-Trump event, discussed training and weapons beforehand, suited up in body armor and broke through the crowd heading into the Capitol in a military-style formation.

Watkins' attorney argued in the new filing she isn't alleged to have been violent in the melee, and that, though she is charged with aiding the destruction of property, didn't participate in vandalism and encouraged others not to as well.

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Watkins' defense attorney, Michelle Peterson, wrote on Saturday that her client and other supporters of Trump had believed the then-President would invoke the Insurrection Act to use the military to overturn what he falsely said was the fraudulent election of Joe Biden. And Watkins and others believed "they would have a role if this were to happen," the filing said. "However misguided, her intentions were not in any way related to an intention to overthrow the government, but to support what she believed to be the lawful government." [...] Watkins' attorney argued in the filing her client had worn tactical gear potentially to defend herself, and walked up the Capitol steps with other Oath Keepers in a "stack" formation because the group may have wanted to stay together in the crowd.

"May have." That's an odd defense.

She has been detained since her arrest in mid-January. The Justice Department is seeking to keep her in jail pending trial.

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She has been detained since her arrest in mid-January. The Justice Department is seeking to keep her in jail pending trial.

Well, she risked getting covid by being in the crowd of insurrectionists. The other...yes, she'd probably be at risk, but the bigger question is how is she a Trump supporter while being transgender? 

 ...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

More coup attempt details

FBI agents around the country are working to unravel the various motives, relationships, goals and actions of the hundreds of Trump supporters who stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6. Some inside the bureau have described the Capitol riot investigation as their biggest case since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, and a top priority of the agents’ work is to determine the extent to which that violence and chaos was preplanned and coordinated.

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FBI personnel in Norfolk were increasingly alarmed by the online conversations they were seeing, including warlike talk around the convoys headed to the nation’s capital. One map posted online described the rally points, declaring them a “MAGA Cavalry To Connect Patriot Caravans to StopTheSteal in D.C.” Another map showed the U.S. Congress, indicating tunnels connecting different parts of the complex. The map was headlined, “CREATE PERIMETER,” according to the FBI report, which was reviewed by The Washington Post.

“Be ready to fight. Congress needs to hear glass breaking, doors being kicked in,” read one posting, according to the report.

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Investigators caution there is an important legal distinction between gathering like-minded people for a political rally — which is protected by the First Amendment — and organizing an armed assault on the seat of American government. The task now is to distinguish which people belong in each category, and who played key roles in committing or coordinating the violence.

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Minutes before the crowd surge, at 12:45 p.m., police received the first report of a pipe bomb behind the Republican National Committee headquarters at the opposite, southeast side of the U.S. Capitol campus. The device and another discovered shortly afterward at Democratic National Committee headquarters included end caps, wiring, timers and explosive powder, investigators have said.

Some law enforcement officials have suggested the pipe bombs may have been a deliberate distraction meant to siphon law enforcement away from the Capitol building at the crucial moment.

  WaPo

Or...pipe bombs.

An indictment Friday night charged a member of the Proud Boys, Dominic Pezzola, 43, of Rochester, N.Y., with conspiracy, saying his actions showed “planning, determination, and coordination.” Another alleged member of the Proud Boys, William Pepe, 31, of Beacon, N.Y., also was charged with conspiracy.

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One of the comments cited in the FBI memo declared Trump supporters should go to Washington and get “violent. Stop calling this a march, or rally, or a protest. Go there ready for war. We get our President or we die.”

Some had been preparing for conflict for weeks.

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Jessica Marie Watkins — an Ohio bartender who had formed her own small, self-styled militia group and had joined Oath Keepers, according to prosecutors — began recruiting and organizing in early November for an “operation.”

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Days after the election, Watkins allegedly sent text messages to a number of individuals who had expressed interest in joining her group, which called itself the Ohio State Regular Militia.

“I need you fighting fit by innaugeration,” she told one recruit, according to court papers.

The same day, she also asked a recruit to download Zello, an app that allows a cellphone to operate like a push-to-talk walkie-talkie, saying her group uses it “for operations.”

In conversations later that month, Watkins allegedly spoke in apocalyptic terms about the prospect of Joe Biden’s being sworn in as president on Jan. 20.

“If he is, our way of life as we know it is over. Our Republic would be over. Then it is our duty as Americans to fight, kill and die for our rights. . . . If Biden get the steal, none of us have a chance in my mind. We already have our neck in the noose. They just haven’t kicked the chair yet.”

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“Historically, within the right-wing extremist movements, leadership has produced rhetoric to spin up their members, increase radicalization and recruitment, and then stand back and let small cells or individual lone offenders follow through on that rhetoric with violent action,” said Thomas O’Connor, a former FBI agent who spent decades investigating domestic terrorists. “Domestic terrorism actually developed the leaderless resistance concept, taking the potential blame away from the leadership and putting it down into small groups or individuals, and I think that is what you’re starting to see here.”

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Colin Clarke, a domestic terrorism expert at the Soufan Group, said the Jan. 6 attack represents a “proof of concept” for dangerous extremists.

“They talk about things like this in a lot of their propaganda, and the fact that the Capitol Police allowed this to happen, you can call it a security breach, or intelligence failure, but these people do not look at this as a failure, they look at it as an overwhelming success, and one that will inspire others for years.”