by Mel Hawley
Last Thursday, in the DC District swamp, the jury for the Jan. 6 trial in the case of USA v K. Joseph Thomas produced a stunning verdict, bringing the government’s narrative to its knees.
The testimony of crooked prosecution witness MPD Police Officer Campanale was shattered by the defense team as his accusations against the defendant proved with the government’s own evidentiary video that he accused Thomas of crimes he committed himself. Campanale and other officers of the MPD had cut the tarps on the bleachers before any protestors were under the bleachers. The government has blamed protesters for this damage, even though there is exculpatory evidence they have possession of Metro Police Officers cutting the tarp down with knives themselves.
Defense attorney, Roger Roots stated:
“Certainly those major cuts on the top of the tarp were done by members of the Metro Police Department, including Campanale. In fact, even in the Proud Boy trial, I sat there as the government presented evidence of all this damage, including the torn tarp as part of the damage that they let the jury believe had been done by either the Proud Boys or supporters of the Proud Boys.”
Before jury selection began on May 15, Judge Dabney Friedrich specified the trial should be wrapped up by that week’s end, but her demeanor changed during the nearly three weeks of grueling jury selection, enlightening testimony and cross examination of police officers, followed by lingering deliberations.
Of Thomas’ twelve federal charges, he was found guilty of seven with two dismissed due to a hung jury, but the three NOT GUILTY judgements proved beyond a reasonable doubt that Joseph Thomas did indeed attend as a peaceful protestor who defended others as he had publicly avowed for the past two years.
Support Joe and his family as he appeals and awaits sentencing. Donate to his GiveSendGo here.
The testimonies of law enforcement officers and the lead federal agent on his case were not compelling, to say the least. Officer Campanale was caught lying on the stand, but of course there will be no consequences for Campanae.
“There are so many questions,” said Tina Ryan of Citizens Against Political Persecution. “Did Officer Campanale collude with the DOJ? Who was he taking orders from on January 6th to destroy the tarp? Who told him to lie on the stand and blame it on Joseph Thomas? Will there be consequences for Campanale?”
Thomas’ charges included 5 charges commonly referred to as “police assault.”
PLEASE HELP OUT JOE THOMAS HERE! He needs our support as he awaits sentencing! (Thomas needs funds for an appeals lawyer to fight the guilty charges and support his young children who are right now without a Dad. Most of the funds in Thomas’ GiveSendGo was spent on his trial legal defense.)
USC 111(a)(1) reads in part:
Whoever—forcibly assaults, resists, opposes, impedes, intimidates, or interferes with any person [officers and employees of the United States] while engaged in or on account of the performance of official duties…
According to the statute, violently punching an officer in the face or merely getting in their way merits the same punishment.
PLEASE HELP OUT JOE THOMAS HERE! He needs our support!
As has been the case in most of these Jan 6 courtrooms, the government’s discovery included hundreds of hours of police body cam. When the defense motioned to allow new exculpatory footage as evidence, the government opposed and the Dishonorable judge denied the motions. The same exercise ensued for motions to allow witnesses. In the end, only two witnesses were allowed to appear for the defense.
With their hands tied, the defense team had to rely heavily on cross examination, the defendant’s testimony, and evidence provided by the government to argue their case.
Five officers and the FBI case agent took the stand for the prosecution.
During the testimony of MPD Officer Campanale, the government introduced video evidence to the courtroom showing interaction between the officer and the defendant near bleachers wrapped in white tarp at the Capitol. The prosecution pointed to a knife in Thomas’ hand as he stood under the bleachers.
In an interview, attorney Roger Roots commented on the testimony and explosive cross examination.
“Joe Thomas was innocent of having a knife. There was a time when another protester handed him a knife and said, “Why don’t you cut the zip ties?” — some zip ties that were holding the tarp to the bleachers–and there was a moment in time where Joe Thomas took the knife, and he was thinking about it. The irony is he thanks (Officer) Campanale because Campanale saw the knife in Joe’s hand for a brief incident and said something like “no, no, no, don’t cut any zip ties.” And then, Joe Thomas handed the knife back to the mysterious, fellow protester. Joe Thomas has said that he thinks it was a set-up of some kind. He doesn’t really know, and we still do not know the identity of the man that handed the knife to him.
Campanale took the stand and testified that he could have arrested Joe Thomas. I believe the prosecutor asked specifically “And, why is that?” And he said, “For cutting the tarp,” and this was startling and very damaging to Thomas at the time. And I can tell you that the defense was not ready for this.
Emily Lambert, who happened to have a great knowledge of a lot of the body cam footage started scrambling immediately at the defense table while Campanale was on the stand. And, fortunately, we were able to find some body cam footage.
And remember, we have access to all this body cam footage in discovery, but keep in mind, I mean, there’s so many hundreds of hours that it’s impossible for any one lawyer to go through it all. We were just fortunate enough that Emily Lambert, the paralegal for our team, had seen that footage. And so, she knew that it was out there. If it hadn’t been for Emily Lambert, we never would have been able to cross examine like we did.
And, so, when I got up to cross examine Campanale, I started out saying, “Well, you didn’t see Mr. Thomas cut the tarp, did you?” He admitted he did not. And I said, “How could you have arrested him without probable cause to arrest?” And he sort of wavered as I recall. And he finally admitted, “Well, I guess I could not have arrested him without probable cause.”
And then I brought up body cam footage from another officer and the government objected, by the way, vehemently, but it did show the incident. It did show Campanale and, so, the judge ruled that it was relevant. So, we started rolling it, and (Officer) Campanale quickly admitted that he was in the image; he was on the body cam footage cutting the tarp himself!
And, so, it didn’t go much farther than that. But it was fairly startling the way it came out later on with another witness on the stand named Steven Hill. We got in a little bit more of that footage which showed that the other officers had cut that entire tarp, probably over 100 ft of tarp that they cut at the top of the west terrace. And, you know, prior to this trial, they have been blaming it on January 6 protesters.
Let’s put it this way, it’s a fluke of fortune that we happened to have a paralegal on our staff that had seen that body cam footage from another officer. It’s a fluke of fortune. If we had not had that, we would have been like so many other defense teams, and we would not have been able to even rebut that, and it would have gone without rebuttal, and the jury would have taken away that Mr. Thomas had probably cut the tarp.”
See the video here of the colluding January 6th cops cutting the tarp:
The jury deliberated for over eight days due, in part, to a break for jury members’ personal obligations and the Memorial Day holiday. On Thursday, June 1, the jury returned a note that they had verdicts for ten of the twelve charges.
Judge Friedrich agreed to a mistrial on the two hung jury verdicts, which included one of the five assaults. As the foreman read the remaining verdicts, the three not guilty charges stood out—USC 1512 Obstruction (a charge punishable by up to twenty years’ incarceration), Violence on Capitol Grounds, and Violence in a Restricted Area. Without violence, the four guilty USC 111 charges were not assaults, and the government’s narrative of Thomas as a violent protestor was squashed. Thomas and his defense team had demonstrated that he did not go to the Capitol to stop certification of the election, nor did he commit violence at the Capitol.
PLEASE HELP OUT JOE THOMAS HERE! He needs our support!
Joseph Thomas commented, post-verdict:
I came into this court battle relying on my faith in God for strength. After much diligent prayer, I witnessed the atmosphere in the courtroom change from hostile to hopeful. In the end, justice prevailed, and my defense team had shown that the government’s narrative that every J6er went to the Capitol as violent extremists bent on interrupting election proceedings was patently false. This was the best foreseeable outcome.
The assault charges are now realized as the lesser elements of impeding, obstructing, and interfering with certain officers. I look forward to when this can all be behind us, and the truth of that day is revealed. Who knows how many defendants have been railroaded by the shady dealings of prosecutors.
I must give an enormous amount of credit to my amazing legal team John Pierce, Roger Roots, Emily Lambert and John Mosley for their due diligence and fearless approach to justice. However, all the glory goes to God for the victory. We all saw His hand at work throughout this entire process and this is only the beginning.
PLEASE HELP OUT JOE THOMAS HERE! He needs our support as he awaits sentencing! (Thomas needs funds for an appeals lawyer to fight the guilty charges and support his young children who are right now without a Dad. Most of the funds in Thomas’ GiveSendGo was spent on his trial legal defense.)
Watch Joe Thomas’ and Roger Roots’ first interview post-verdict with Mel Hawley here.
PLEASE HELP OUT JOE THOMAS HERE! He needs our support! And check out Joe’s website.