Judge: Massive scope of Jan. 6 probe led to rights being 'trampled'

A judge warned the Justice Department on Monday that it might be seeking to pursue so many cases stemming from the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol Riot that some defendants’ rights were being trampled.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Zia Faruqui delivered the stern rebuke to federal prosecutors at a hearing for a Texas man who the judge said was “lost” in the court system after being arrested in December and accused of assaulting police officers during the storming of the Capitol.

“You have been lost for months,” Faruqui told Lucas Denney of Mansfield, Texas, during a hearing in a Washington courtroom. “There’s no excuse to treat a human being like that. … There is no circumstance under which any person should be forgotten.”

Faruqui said the mammoth nature of the federal investigation, which has led to charges against more than 750 people, was no justification for Denney’s languishing in custody.

“The government has chosen to charge the largest case ever,” said the magistrate judge, who noted he was formerly a federal prosecutor in the same U.S. Attorney’s Office leading the investigation. “If they do not have the resources to do it, they ought not do that. … It feels like the government has bitten off more than it can chew here.”

“I don’t doubt that this is the largest case in the history of the Department of Justice,” Faruqui said at another point during the hourlong session on Monday. “Ultimately, that just does not matter to me. … I hope to dear God that no one else has fallen through the cracks.”

Denney was arrested Dec. 13 on a criminal complaint charging that he grappled with police at the Capitol, swung a metal pole at an officer and threw projectiles at a line of police. He appeared in federal court in Del Rio, Texas, on Dec. 14 and Dec. 17.

A magistrate judge there ordered Denney detained without bail and transferred to Washington, but court records show it took Denney more than six weeks, until Jan. 31, to reach a jail in Virginia where some Capitol Riot defendants are being held.

However, no court appearance for Denney was scheduled for weeks after he arrived. Last week, his lawyers filed an emergency motion seeking his release and the dismissal of the charges.

“It is outrageous and the court should not countenance it,” said one of Denney’s attorneys, William Shipley.

Prosecutors provided the court with a timeline but no real explanation for the six-week delay in getting Denney to the Washington area, nor for the more than three weeks that elapsed before anyone contacted the D.C. court to get a hearing for Denney.

“I understand the concerns of the court,” New Mexico-based Assistant U.S. Attorney Jennifer Rozzoni said.

Rozzoni had one announcement on Monday that complicated Denney’s bid for freedom. She told the court that a grand jury had indicted Denney on Monday on a single count related to the Jan. 6 events. “We did bring a case to the grand jury,” Rozzoni said.

A spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment for this article.

Faruqui said he was inclined to release Denney on Monday, but the new indictment appeared to foreclose his ability to dismiss the case.

“I am utterly at a loss. … I see a person’s rights that have been trampled,” the judge said. He said he was troubled by the legal precedents on the issue because they suggested there was no consequence for the government’s mishandling of the case. “We will just be doomed to repeat the same failures,” Faruqui said.

He ultimately ordered Denney to remain in custody but agreed to receive written arguments from both sides on any other steps he could consider.

While Shipley and Rozzoni appeared via video, Denney appeared in person in front of Faruqui on Monday, accompanied by attorney John Pierce. Denney, who wore a dark blue Northern Neck Regional Jail jumpsuit and light blue surgical mask, told the judge he appreciated his concern about the unusual delay in his case.

“Thank you for taking this seriously and stuff like that,” Denney told the judge. The defendant called himself a single father and broke down briefly as he described the impact of the case on his children. “They’ve failed every grade in their school,” he said. “It’s been hard on them.”

Faruqui, who was appointed as a magistrate in September 2020, profusely apologized to Denney and tried to assure him that the prosecution’s handling of the case was inadvertent, not intentional.

“They’re not trying to ruin your life,” he said. “This is not the norm.”

The magistrate judge’s apologies to Denney on Monday were not his first to Jan. 6 defendants. Almost a year ago, Faruqui complained about another defendant, Jonathan Mellis, taking three weeks to be moved from Virginia to D.C. Prosecutors attributed many delays to such factors as coronavirus precautions and bad weather.

Faruqui used very similar language then, declaring himself “very upset” and describing the need to figure out “what the hell is going on” with the delays. The judge also announced that he was implementing a system to be sure that the situation wasn’t repeated.

“The buck has got to stop somewhere and it stops with the judges,” Faruqui said last March. “Whatever little solace it is, we are going to figure out what happened and ensure it doesn’t happen to somebody else.”