Jan6: The American Gulag

grarpamp grarpamp at gmail.com
Tue Mar 14 00:30:16 PDT 2023


> jailing political dissidents and free speech,
> same as every other shithole country...
>
> "Free Jacob Chansley": 'QAnon Shaman' Backed After New J6 Footage Emerges


Jan. 6 Attorney Alleges FBI Criminally Altered Evidence, Requests
Special Master Review Of Leaked Messages

https://www.theepochtimes.com/jan-6-attorney-alleges-fbi-criminally-altered-evidence-requests-special-master-review-of-leaked-messages_5117377.html
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23703988-pezzola-attorney-motion-to-dismiss-and-special-master-request-march-12-2023
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23699523-proud-boys-motion-to-dismiss
https://casetext.com/case/matter-of-fusco-v-moses-1
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23704001-government-reponse-to-pezzola-motion-to-dismiss-march-12-2023
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23704002-government-filing-on-pezzola-case-687-march-12-2023

Rogers Roots, an attorney representing Dominic Pezzola, a Jan. 6,
2021, Capitol breach defendant, alleged on Sunday that the FBI had
committed crimes by altering evidence and requested that the court
appoint a special master to review the evidence.
Protesters loyal to President Donald Trump rally at the U.S. Capitol
in Washington on Jan. 6, 2021. (AP Photo/ Jose Luis Magana)

Roots’s move came days after the testimony of FBI Special Agent Nicole
Miller, who was involved in the agency’s investigations of the Jan. 6
defendants. When cross-examining Miller, Nick Smith, an attorney
representing Proud Boys member Ethan Nordean (listed as co-defendant
on Pezzola’s case), revealed classified FBI emails that were hidden in
a tab in an Excel spreadsheet, which included a directive to Miller to
“destroy” 338 pieces of evidence and “edit out” an FBI agent from an
informant report.

“Destroying evidence is a federal crime. It actually falls under a
federal crime under more than one statute. The same goes with altering
documents, altering records, that is a federal crime,” the John Pierce
Law attorney told The Epoch Times in an interview on Sunday.

In a filing on Sunday, Roots requested that Timothy J. Kelly, a Trump
appointee presiding over the case, either dismiss the case in its
entirety or appoint a special master to independently review the FBI
messages that were revealed in court.

“The unceremonious and uninhibited nature of Miller’s discussion of
committing these serious crimes suggests an FBI culture of corruption
and lawlessness that must be immediately stopped, and fully
investigated,” Roots said in the filing.

“Accordingly, this case must be dismissed en toto and with prejudice,”
Roots’s filing continues. “Even if the Court were to overlook this
massive trail of FBI corruption and the trial were to proceed,
defendants have a right to cross-examine Agent Miller regarding all of
these crimes, her missing emails, her discussions of violating
defendants’ 6th amendment rights, her discussions of evidence
tampering, and her discussions of altering documents involving
[confidential human sources] in this case.”

“All January 6 prosecutions should be paused for evidentiary hearings
and investigations by a Special Master and Special Counsel,” the
filing reads.
The Leaked Messages

A key question about these leaked messages is whether they fall under
the scope of evidence in the case.

Roots said in the filing that the messages show a violation of due
process, reiterating his argument in an earlier filing that the FBI’s
monitoring of communications between a co-defendant, Zachary Rehl, and
his attorney violated the Sixth Amendment, which prohibits invasion of
the right to counsel (Matter of Fusco v. Moses).

“Miller’s hidden messages reveal casual discussions among the FBI
regarding the monitoring of codefendant Rehl’s trial strategy, Rehl’s
defenses and ‘interesting’ points, and ways the government can get
around Rehl’s defenses,” Roots said in the Sunday filing.

In the filing, Roots requested the court dismiss Pezzola’s case with
prejudice, appoint a special counsel, appoint a special master,
schedule extensive evidentiary hearings, and release Pezzola from
custody.

The DOJ, on the other hand, said that because Rehl and his attorney
were communicating over a monitored prison system, they waived the
right to attorney-client privileges.

“The government has not obtained any privileged communications between
defendant Rehl and Moseley,” the government wrote in response to
Roots’s contentions in a filing on Sunday. “As the government
explained in a separate filing … Rehl and Moseley made a fully
informed choice to communicate with one another over a monitored jail
email system. In doing so, they waived any privilege.”

Further, the DOJ said Roots’s argument about the government destroying
evidence is void, arguing that the messages are unrelated to the case.

“This ‘destruction’ of evidence related to the disposition of 338
items of evidence from a nearly 20-year-old multi codefendant trial,”
the DOJ said in a separate filing on Sunday. “Pursuant to policy, the
FBI waited to dispose of the evidence until all defendants’ appellate
rights were extinguished.”

“The special agent disposed of this evidence by returning it to
defendants’ family members or otherwise destroying it pursuant to FBI
policy. The case was not related to this prosecution, and the agent
was not involved in this investigation,” the DOJ’s filing reads.

The government then argued that Pezzola had not demonstrated that he
suffered “injury” or material damages in the trial as a result of the
government’s collections, citing United States v. Mastroianni, which
says “a Sixth Amendment violation cannot be established without a
showing that there is a ‘realistic possibility of injury’ to
defendants or ‘benefit to the State’ as a result of the government’s
intrusion into the attorney-client relationship.

For the reasons above, the government requested the court to deny all
of Roots’s requests.

But according to Roots, the messages, at minimum, deserve a deeper look.

“Put it this way: it cries out for someone to investigate it,” Roots
told the Epoch Times on Sunday, referring to the leaked messages.

“I believe that the trial needs to come to a halt while we investigate
these questions,” Roots said.

The FBI declined to comment and referred The Epoch Times to the U.S.
Attorney’s Office for comment.

U.S. Attorney’s Office did not provide The Epoch Times with comment by
press time.


More information about the cypherpunks mailing list