A federal judge just acquitted a man being prosecuted by the DOJ for being inside the Capitol on January 6th during the riot.
BREAKING: Jan. 6 defendant Matthew Martin has been acquitted on all charges by Judge Trevor McFadden. He was facing four misdemeanor counts in this non-jury bench trial.
— Kyle Cheney (@kyledcheney) April 6, 2022
According to Politico, Matthew Martin was facing four misdemeanor charges of entering a restricted area, disorderly conduct in a restricted area and on Capitol grounds, and demonstrating in the Capitol.
But the judge acquitted him of everything because it appeared that he was let into the Capitol by police.
Following a two-day bench trial in U.S. District Court in Washington, New Mexico engineer Matthew Martin was acquitted Wednesday on four misdemeanor charges by U.S. District Court Judge Trevor McFadden. Martin claimed that he thought the police had allowed him into an entrance near the Capitol Rotunda on Jan. 6, 2021.
McFadden said that, based on video of the scene, that assertion was at least “plausible” and that prosecutors failed to prove the case beyond a reasonable doubt.
“People were streaming by and the officers made no attempt to stop the people,” said the judge…
Prosecutors argued that broken windows and blaring alarms should have alerted Martin that he did not have permission to enter, but McFadden said the sheer size of the crowd coupled with the conduct of the police undermined that evidence.
The ruling is a blow to the Justice Department and seems likely to elevate similar defenses from hundreds of other members of the mob who have claimed that they didn’t know they weren’t permitted inside the Capitol and believed that police officers had approved their presence.
So what are the critics going with over this acquittal? That the judge was appointed by Trump:
McFadden’s verdict is the latest in a series of rulings from the Trump-appointed judge that have disappointed prosecutors and broken sharply from colleagues on the U.S. District Court in Washington.
McFadden has repeatedly given short probation sentences to Jan. 6 defendants who the Justice Department has said deserved jail time. And he has questioned the merit of some of the misdemeanor cases that the department has brought against some nonviolent defendants in the Jan. 6 mob.
That’s the narrative put forth by Politico and Democrats are lapping it up.
But as many have noted after video footage emerged, the fact that police let some into the building at the beginning means those people weren’t trespassing. The judge acknowledged this.
And if they didn’t participate in the riot, then they did nothing wrong. Which is clearly what happened here with Matthew Martin.
The judge noted that there was nothing ‘disorderly’ about Martin’s conduct, saying “He seemed quite quiet and orderly. He did not shout. He did not raise his flag.”
You can read more about it here.