Attorneys Claim Government Manufacturing Evidence To Charge, Incarcerate Jan. 6 Prisoners

Authored by Patricia Tolson via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

As Jan. 6 prisoners continue to languish in jail without trials, without bond and in subhuman conditions, two Jan. 6 attorneys are claiming the government is manufacturing evidence to arrest and incarcerate them. Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) says the government is also “hiding evidence” that could possibly exonerate some of them.

This is not the first time Democrats have manufactured evidence to support their allegations in a legal proceeding.

A History of Fabricating Evidence

In July of 2018, the infamous Steele dossier was revealed to be little more than a collection of unverified opposition research funded by Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee (DNC), to obtain a warrant to spy on former Trump campaign volunteer Carter Page and to derail the Trump campaign.

During a Sept. 26, 2019, Intelligence Committee hearing, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) read a fabricated transcript of a phone call between former President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. When he was caught, he claimed it was “a parody.”

During the first impeachment trials in February 2021, Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) used a photoshopped version of a Twitter post Trump re-tweeted about supporters “fighting” for the country to make it seem more ominous.

After being caught and being forced to admit they doctored a text message between Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) and former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows during the December 2021 Jan. 6 hearings, and also excluded content about how they had wanted former Vice President Mike Pence to handle electoral votes during the Joint Session of Congress, Jordan further opined that their statement saying “We regret the error,” is really government-speak for, “We got caught lying.”

At the televised House committee hearing related to the protests that took place at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 6, 2021—Jordan said members of the House select committee had altered a text message exchange between him and former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows “and lied to the American people about it.”

J-6 Cases: ‘Manipulating Evidence’

Joseph McBride, an attorney for multiple Jan. 6 prisoners and defendants, is certain the government is “manipulating evidence.”

“In terms of attorneys,” McBride told The Epoch Times, “I’m probably the most outspoken attorney in the United States of America who is representing Jan. 6 defendants.”

McBride said he has “five, going on six” criminal defendants related to Jan. 6 and three civil rights cases. He also represented five Jan. 6 defendants before the Jan. 6 committee. Considering the depth of his involvement, McBride believes he’s “far and away” the most eligible and outspoken attorney among those attached to the Jan. 6 legal battles.

“You are not allowed to punish a pre-trial detainee in the United States of America because you are innocent until proven guilty” McBride stated. “It is only after you have been convicted of a crime or plead through a crime that you can be punished for a crime. Punishment for a crime is deprivation of freedom. … My clients and others like them have been brutally assaulted. They’ve been locked away in cells for months at a time. They’ve been denied medical care and have had their human rights, their civil rights, and their constitutional rights violated by the staff at the D.C. gulag, by the staff at the Northern Neck jail because they have been green-lighted by the Biden machine to harm anybody who showed up at the Capitol on January 6 to speak out about the election results. It is unconstitutional. It is immoral. It is un-American. It is wrong.”

Suspicious Affidavits

McBride also says the government’s use of lengthy and extravagantly detailed affidavits is “much different than your normal cases and they’re frontloading these complaints with facts that aren’t proven and these allegations are subsequently being weaponized in the court of public opinion.”

According to McBride, complaint affidavits are generally written as hastily as possible because the only purpose of a complaint affidavit is to initiate the legal process by establishing probable cause. Complaint affidavits are normally followed quickly by the return of an indictment by a grand jury.

But the Jan. 6 complaint affidavits can run in excess of 20, 30, 40, and even 50 pages long, which begs the question of “why?”

For McBride, the answer is simple. Because Department of Justice (DOJ) policy only allows the government to make public comments about matters that are already a matter of public record, making sure all of that detail is part of the public record enables the government to release this information to the public to destroy the reputations of the accused ahead of a trial.

Another Jan. 6 attorney, Bill Shipley, is equally convinced the government is manufacturing evidence to support a narrative.

Shipley has called into question the validity of photo and video screenshot “evidence” used in three of his cases. Two of them are outlined below.

The Case of Brian Mock

According to the 14-page Criminal Complaint (pdf), Brian Christopher Mock has been charged with: “Assaulting, Resisting, or Impeding Certain Officers, Knowingly Entering or Remaining in any Restricted Building or Grounds Without Lawful Authority; Disorderly and Disruptive Conduct in a Restricted Building or Grounds, Obstruction of Law Enforcement During Civil Disorder, Acts of Physical Violence in any of the Capitol Buildings or Grounds.”

However, all of the charges are based on screen grabs from videos that do not confirm the allegations.

Shipley told The Epoch Times “both the government and the court have acknowledged that video 1 does not show any actual assault by defendant Mock as alleged in the indictment.”

“If video 1 showed Mr. Mock kicking the fallen officer it would have been simple to write, ‘The video shows Mr. Mock kicking the fallen officer,’” Shipley said. “Judge Howell didn’t write that because video 1 doesn’t show that.  The government knows it, Mr. Mock knows it, and Judge Howell knew it.

“The simple reality is that video 1 shows the unidentified victim officer already on the ground when Mr. Mock is first seen on camera. There are two other protesters—one wearing camouflage and the other wearing a red hat—on the ground with the victim officer at the moment defendant Mock is first seen. Defendant Mock is standing in close proximity to the three of them.  He is not seen shoving the fallen officer to the ground.”

According to Shipley, the entire segment of video 1, which is relevant to the first alleged assault, lasts only four seconds. At no point during those four seconds does video 1 show Mock’s foot making contact with any part of the Officer’s body.

“Nevertheless, the government made a proffer in its emergency motion (pdf) that the video showed defendant Mock shoving the officer to the ground and then kicking the officer” and “relied heavily on a single screenshot from the video that appears to show defendant Mock’s right foot off the ground.”

“If the government had video of Mr. Mock’s right foot striking the victim officer, it is quite certain it would have included a screenshot of that particular moment instead of the one it choose,” Shipley argued. “The obvious conclusion is the government has no such video.  It hasn’t produced one in discovery.”

In another incident, Mock is accused of shoving an officer to the ground, causing and injury to the officer’s right elbow.

According to the 14-page criminal complaint (pdf), filed June 10, 2021, by Special Agent Beth Alvarez, “Officer [SK] recalled being shoved onto his back by one of the rioters. During the melee, Officer [SK’s] right elbow was hit right in the area where two protective pads on his arm meet.”

When Mock was arrested, Alvarez—the affiant on the complaint affidavit—wrote the following statement under oath:

“According to Victim 2, his right elbow hit the ground right in the area where two pads come together after the shove, causing excruciating pain at the time of impact.”

The complaint affidavit is dated June 10, 2021, precisely one month after the interview of the officer. During the 30 days between those two documents, the mechanics of how the officer injured his elbow changed. She first wrote he suffered the injury to his elbow “during the melee,” without reference to Mock or his actions. However, one month later, Alvarez wrote that his right elbow hit the ground right in the area where the two pads come together as a result of Mock’s shove.

Brian Mock has created a GiveSendGo account to help offset his ongoing legal expenses.

Read more here…