Ruling vacates convictions of founder Stewart Rhodes and other militia members who took part in 2021 Capitol attack
A US judge on Tuesday granted the justice department’s bid to dismiss cases against members of the rightwing Oath Keepers militia who took part in the 6 January 2021 attack on the US Capitol, according to a court filing.
The ruling from Washington-based US district judge Amit Mehta tosses out convictions of Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes and other members of the group who were convicted of seditious conspiracy for plotting to stop the transfer of power after Donald Trump lost the 2020 election.
All nine of the defendants had already been freed from prison as part of Trump’s sweeping move to pardon nearly all of the 1,600 people charged in the attack and commute the prison sentences of the remaining defendants.
“Today’s epilogue diminishes the gravity of that day, denigrates the work of the prosecutors and law enforcement officers who secured these convictions, and excuses criminal acts that caused a centuries-long pillar of our democracy – the peaceful transfer of presidential power – to buckle,” Mehta wrote.
“The court cannot write a different ending.”