Fallout continues from US Supreme Court Jan. 6 ruling

A California U.S. Army veteran serving an 18-month prison sentence for obstructing Congress on Jan. 6, 2021, was ordered released July 12 under the U.S. Supreme Court ruling on the most commonly charged Jan. 6 felony and its maximum 20-year prison term.

Jorge Aaron Riley, 46, of Sacramento, will be released “forthwith” from the federal lockup in Lompoc, California, under an order issued July 12 by U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta in Washington, D.C. Mehta granted Riley's request for bail pending resolution of a motion to vacate the sentence.

Riley’s release is the latest fallout from the Supreme Court’s ruling in the landmark case Fischer v. United States. In a 6-3 opinion on June 28, the high court said the U.S. Department of Justice could only use the felony obstructing charge if it could prove defendants impaired the use of documents, objects, or “other things” used during counting of Electoral College votes at the U.S. Capitol Jan. 6.

Riley was arrested in January 2021 and later indicted on five criminal counts, including felony obstruction and misdemeanors related to alleged trespassing on Capitol grounds. In March 2023, he accepted a plea deal on the one obstructing count under 18 U.S. Code §1512(c)(2).

In the FBI’s original statement of facts in the case, Riley was seen on various videos boasting that he made it into the Capitol. “We broke windows, we went into the door, we pushed our way in, and then we just kept going further and further,” Riley said, according to the FBI.

'Tom Caldwell is literally the Richard Jewell of January 6.'

Despite that statement, Riley was not charged with damage to property or assaulting law enforcement. The FBI quoted Riley’s words extensively from more than 150 posts he made on Facebook on Jan. 6 and in the days after.

“We stopped the steal because they were in there and they weren’t going to stop the steal, so we stopped the steal,” he wrote in one post. “We took our country back. F*** you guys.”

Although many Jan. 6 defendants and their attorneys hailed the Supreme Court ruling as a victory, it appears that the DOJ is not giving up on making the felony charge stick. In numerous court filings since June 28, prosecutors expressed the view that the Supreme Court did not ban them from using §1512(c)(2), a law enacted in 2002 to fight corporate fraud after the Enron accounting scandal.

In the case of Guy Wesley Reffitt, “the court did not reject the application of §1512(c)(2) to January 6 prosecutions,” a DOJ filing said. “Rather, the court explained that the government must establish that the defendant impaired the availability or integrity for use in an official proceeding of records, documents, objects, or other things used in the proceeding — such as witness testimony or intangible information — or attempted to do so.”

In some court filings, the DOJ made what appear to be new allegations. Responding to probationer Tara Stottlemyer’s motion to vacate her §1512(c)(2) conviction, prosecutors said she “intended to stop the certification proceeding and affect the voting and balloting underlying the certification.”

Defense attorney William Shipley said this approach is not going to work. He filed a motion to compel the government to produce grand jury testimony proving Stottlemyer impaired documents or records used in the counting of Electoral College votes.

“There can be no dispute that the second superseding indictment did not describe in any fashion records, documents, objects or ‘other things’ being impaired or otherwise manipulated by Ms. Stottlemyer at any time on January 6, 2021,” Shipley wrote July 5.

'There is no evidence he engaged in any such conduct on January 6, 2021.'

Shipley said the motion was filed "on the grounds that the failure to offer testimony about 'evidence impairment' is now exculpatory if the government suddenly has some magic evidence or theory to try and salvage these convictions."

Prosecutors are asking for delays in most obstruction-related cases to more fully assess the impacts of the Fischer decision. The High Court remanded the case to the U.S. Court of Appeals “for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.”

The sentencing hearing for Thomas E. Caldwell — found guilty in the first Oath Keepers trial in November 2022 of obstruction of an official proceeding and tampering with documents or proceedings — is scheduled for Oct. 22. Caldwell was found not guilty of three other counts.

Defense attorney David Fischer said he plans to file a renewed motion for acquittal on Caldwell’s obstruction charge. Before the Supreme Court ruling in the Fischer case, prosecutors said they would ask Judge Mehta to sentence Caldwell to 14 years in prison.

"The Supreme Court dealt a major blow to the DOJ's over-zealous prosecution of Tom Caldwell and other J6ers," Fischer told Blaze News. "We will be requesting that the court reconsider its earlier denial of our motion for acquittal and find Tom not guilty. Tom Caldwell is literally the Richard Jewell of January 6."

Jewell was a security guard falsely accused of taking part in the bombing of the Olympic Games in Atlanta in 1996. Despite helping clear the area around a suspicious backpack that detonated a short time later, Jewell fell under FBI suspicion and the resulting hail of negative media coverage. He was later exonerated.

John Strand, serving a 32-month prison sentence for §1512(c)(2) obstruction of Congress and four misdemeanors, has filed a second motion for release pending the appeal of his sentence.

Defense attorney Nicholas Smith said there was nothing introduced at trial showing Strand committed evidence impairment. Even if there was such evidence, Smith wrote, it would have to be charged under §1512(c)(1), which was not among Strand's counts.

In a February 2024 memorandum opinion denying Strand's release, U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper said if the Supreme Court were to toss out §1512(c)(2), "Strand’s conviction under the same statute would likely be reversed as well because there is no evidence he engaged in any such conduct on January 6, 2021."