A press release from the US Attorney says about zip-tie guy, "Eric Gavelek Munchel, of Tennessee, was charged with one count of knowingly entering or remaining in any restricted building or grounds without lawful authority and one count of violent entry and disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds. Munchel was arrested today in Tennessee.
It is alleged that Munchel was inside of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Photos depicting his presence show a person who appears to be Munchel carrying plastic restraints, an item in a holster on his right hip, and a cell phone mounted on his chest with the camera facing outward, ostensibly to record events that day."
Today’s “Yeah, right” award goes to Eric Gavelek Munchel for his claim that he “found the zip-ties on the floor and picked them up, intending to give them to a police officer if he encountered one”
True, I’m combining “excuse for a crime” with “purpose of a crime.”
In the “but someone told me the jewelry was mine!” example, it’s just a lame excuse that will fail to avoid prosecution, but isn’t a crime in itself.
In the “but Rush and Trump told me the election was mine!” example, it’s BOTH a lame excuse AND further evidence of a crime in itself (sedition), that makes punishment more severe than it would have been otherwise.
From their belief system and statements that was not the PURPOSE. They believe they are saving democracy not ending it, and saving an election from being stolen. And their belief in that matters as little as a thief believing that they are just recovering what has been stolen from them. Don’t matter. The thief broke in and tried to take it by force. Maybe he tried to convince the police and the courts first and they all told him that he had no evidence that the jewelry was theirs so sorry. He thinks the process failed him. Still, no matter. The action was the crime. And the insurrectionists broke into the Capitol trying to “save” the election they feel was stolen from them by force. That action is the crime.
I will agree that a stated intent to cause violence or to kill matters.
You may need to do a little more than to drop that link here.
You have made a claim that they should be punished “more severely” because of a “stated purpose … specifically to end American democracy” (elimination of your all caps sections mine).
I do not believe they had that “stated purpose”. Their stated purpose was to save American democracy from being stolen, as their honestly held belief. Proving that their motivation was to end American democracy would not be able to be done.
OTOH the actions of those who forced entry into the capitol to disrupt (prevent/hinder/delay) the certification process were clearly “to oppose by force the authority thereof, or by force to prevent, hinder, or delay the execution of any law of the United States”, even if they believed they were doing it to save the country and to save democracy. And as I pointed out in my first post of this hijack that’s “what they actually DID: insurrection.”
Now per your link that meets the legal definition of “seditious conspiracy” … and your link seems to set an upper bound on the consequence of such but no minimal punishment established: a fine or “or imprisoned not more than twenty years, or both.”
So though they might have had a stated purpose to save democracy, to object to what they think was an injustice and a crime, whatever they believed, does not matter. They are guilty of seditious conspiracy.
I’m curious to learn more about the insider assistance they may have had. Someone (perhaps this thread, perhaps another) linked to a TMZ article that FBI sources suspect inside assistance based on how fast they got to the office of the Speaker of the House, that getting there requires going through a maze of hallways and her office is not labeled. Congressman Clyburn’s office was also invaded and it’s also unmarked, so he said on CNN that he thinks the people had insider assistance.
Would asking potential juror whether or not the 2020 election was valid be an acceptable question during jury selection? Or something similar to weed out crazy people?
Okey dokey. We agree on all the important matters. I think we’re just quibbling about the deeper meanings of the word “purpose”…as you said, best addressed in a different thread, someday. A bit of Aristotle to whet our whistle:
Sorry to add one more thing, but D_Seid made me think harder about this. It might come down to a rather important point: How far back should we go, when tracing the roots of white nationalist delusions?
True, many of them truly believe Trump won the election. But in order for these fools (who nevertheless manage to put their pants on each morning) to swallow so many obvious lies, to ignore so much evidence, they must have started traveling down a much longer path to get to this point…and they indeed embarked on that path with a STATED PURPOSE, no ambiguity, no nitpicking about false but sincerely held beliefs.
And that purpose was to maintain white hegemony.
So, they started with a heinous (but not in itself illegal) purpose. This led them to an illegal act (entering and vandalizing the Capitol, and in many cases threatening the safety of elected leaders and others),with seditious consequences (preventing congressional business) meriting further punishment.
The fact that the specific activity that was disrupted — confirming an election — DID (DOES) heinously threaten or erode our democracy, isn’t a direct issue here. D_Seid is right; legally, they’ll be just as severely punished as if the congress had been working on renaming a post office.
But in a deeper sense, a CONSCIOUS desire to thwart democracy — to maintain white power when it was becoming clear, years ago, that this could not be maintained by democratic means (the numbers just aren’t there) — DID set in motion the chain of events that led to this.
Perhaps there should be another law, another defined crime, another stronger punishment for this particular motivation (as expressed in actual action) — and maybe there is (interfering in elections?), but I don’t recall hearing this discussed in regards to this riot (correct me if I’m wrong).
Isn’t that allowed for in the range of the potential punishments already allowed in the relevant law? But I assume there aren’t any sentencing guidelines on where different acts fit on the spectrum, since there presumably haven’t been many precedent cases.
I agree that such might be, likely is, the original cause, but am fairly sure that only some are even conscious of that. Many would explicitly deny holding such racist beliefs. Oh you’ve got the explicit WP and six million not enough crowd there, but many others there likely convince themselves that such is not why they are there, they have Black and Jewish friends after all (!), and have no documentary trail of such.
Are there federal sentencing guidelines if a crime is also demonstrated to be a hate crime?
