Some January 6th defendants are claiming that police were too violent and harsh with rioters who were attacking the Capitol in an attempt to overthrow the U.S. government.
Jake Lang says that he and dozens of other individuals who were charged for attacking the Capitol on January 6th have filed a lawsuit against the Capitol Police for use of excess force during the failed insurrection attempt.
There may be a few hurdles — such as Lang’s charges for assaulting police, video documentation of the riot, and the J6 rioters’ own claim that the whole thing was super peaceful with friendly police escorts.
In a clip you’ll see below, Lang tells right-wing media that 78 defendants are suing police for excessive force, citing injuries such as his own: a rubber bullet hit his foot.
Lang, incidentally, is described in his own criminal case first as using a riot shield to protect fellow rioters while they swing bats and batons at officers; later as swinging a bat at officers himself, striking “at least the shields the officers held in front of them;” and finally, after the insurrection failed, as promising that the next step is “guns,.
“The First Amendment didn’t work, we pull out the Second,” Lang added.
Lang has a Twitter account that may be run by a third party (likely because Jake is in prison and because the account typically refers to him in the third person), and that account posted a video clip that is purportedly of U.S. Capitol Police general counsel Thomas DiBiase being served with a summons. Dibiase refuses service and directs the individual to send any such documents to his office rather than his home.
Judge Dabney L. Friedrich, a Trump appointee, was assigned the case, in which plaintiffs include Proud Boys Zachary Rehl (convicted of seditious conspiracy among other crimes) and Dominic Pezzola, Oath Keeper Kenneth Harrelson, and Lang, along with dozens of others.
It alleges that police on the scene did not give sufficient warning that the rioters should stop attacking the Capitol and leave the buildings they illegally occupied, and that “out of control” officers have “testi-lied” at criminal hearings to blame rioters for the violence they actually committed themselves.
They further argue that they couldn’t be guilty of attempting to interfere with the transfer of power, since that doesn’t happen on January 6th — although prosecutors have consistently made the case that rioters were interfering with one of the significant and necessary steps in that process, which does happen on that day.
The attorney for the case is reportedly Stefanie Lambert, who is currently facing charges herself in Michigan, where she’s accused of being a part of the voting machine tampering scheme, specifically “undue possession of a voting machine, conspiracy to commit undue possession of a voting machine, conspiracy to commit unauthorized access to a computer system and willfully damaging a voting machine,” according to Axios.
J6 inmate Jake Lang announces tonight that 78 J6 defendants have just filed a class action lawsuit against 21 Capitol Police Officers for millions of dollars for injuries he claims the police caused them by using excessive force. pic.twitter.com/6Z5QaHHMBk
— Ron Filipkowski (@RonFilipkowski) April 6, 2024
The video below purports to be an attempt to serve the USCP general counsel at his home.
https://twitter.com/JakeLangJ6/status/1776302110700613798
