The sins of the father: January 6th and the Reffitt case
Have you heard of Guy Reffitt, the person who received the longest sentence so far of all the Jan 6ers (at least, as of August 1, 2022, that article’s dateline)?:
Guy Reffitt, a Texan who prosecutors said “lit the match” of the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, was sentenced to 7 1/4 years in prison on Monday, the longest sentence of any rioter to date but less than what the Justice Department had pushed for.
Reffitt, a 49-year-old from Wylie, was the first rioter to to be convicted at trial in March when a jury found him guilty on five counts: two counts of civil disorder and one count each of obstruction of an official proceeding, entering and remaining on restricted grounds with a firearm and obstruction of justice.
That jury was in Washington DC.
This was what Reffitt did – and what he did not do [emphasis mine]:
Prosecutors sought to enhance his sentence to 15 years using a provision in federal law that allows for harsher punishment in terrorism cases, though Reffitt was not convicted of a terrorism charge. Reffitt’s case is the first time prosecutors have sought a terrorism enhancement sentencing for a Jan. 6 rioter.
The longest sentence of all Jan. 6 rioters was previously 5 1/4 years, which was given to two defendants. Prosecutors claimed that because Reffitt was armed with a firearm, chose to go to trial and was a primary instigator in the riots, he deserved the longest sentence to date.
F. Clinton Broden, a Texas-based lawyer whom Reffitt retained after his conviction, called for a sentencing of 24 months, claiming the case is different than other Jan. 6 rioters because Reffitt never entered the building, did not assault police and did not remove the handgun from his holster. Reffitt never conceded at the trial that he had a loaded weapon but bragged to fellow Three Percenters after the insurrection that “we all had weapons but never fired a single round.” Reffitt has already been held for 19 months in a Washington, D.C., jail.
I have little doubt that had Reffitt been a participant in a leftist demonstration, he would not have been tried, or if tried, would have received a slap on the wrist. In the Reffitt case, however, the prosecution actually sought a much longer sentence for Reffitt under a terrorism-enhancement provision, which the judge denied.
Please read the whole thing; it’s an exceptionally interesting case. One of the interesting aspects of it – for me at least – is the role Reffitt’s son played:
The obstruction of justice charge refers to threats Reffitt made to his son. Jackson Reffitt submitted a tip to the FBI on Christmas Eve, warning that his father planned to do “some serious damage.” No one responded to the tip…
After the riot, Reffitt told his daughter and son that “if you turn me in, you’re a traitor, and traitors get shot,” his son testified during the trial.
The same day of the threat, Jackson Reffitt met with an FBI agent and turned over images and recordings of his father.
Reffitt’s lawyer downplayed the threats.
“While Mr. Reffitt’s paranoid statements to two of his children are not to be condoned, he never gave any indication he would actually harm his children,”’ Broden wrote in his sentencing request of 24 months. “Indeed, his wife has stated that, while she was understandably ‘disturbed’ by her husband’s ‘extreme’ statements to his children, she did not believe that he would ever act on those statements.”
Reffitt senior is obviously a hothead, but all of his supposed crimes involved words. He and his son certainly seem to have political disagreements that have been ramped up and weaponized by the government, with the cooperation of the son. My guess is that their conflicts are not solely limited to political topics, either, and that this has a long history with them.
Jackson Reffitt has since moved out of the home. In a statement read at Monday’s hearing, he called for the maximum sentence for his father and hoped for mental health treatment to be a part of his sentence.
A daughter seems to have been somewhat involved, as well:
“I could really see how my father[’]s ego and personality fell to his knees when President Trump spoke, you could tell he listened to Trump’s words as if he was really truly speaking to him,” his daughter said in a letter to the court.
Here’s the son:
Notice how the CNN reporter frames Reffitt’s action in a way that leads the listener to imagine something that did not occur, when she says, “He brought a gun to the Capitol and threatened Speaker Nancy Pelosi.” Sounds like he was in the Capitol with the gun (he was not), and that he threatened Pelosi with it (he did not). His “threat” to Pelosi took this form, according to the Texas Tribune article:
In a recording played during Reffitt’s trial, he is shown on Jan. 6 saying he wanted to drag lawmakers outside of the Capitol “kicking and screaming” and that he wanted to see House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s head hit every stair on the way down.
When I read that, I wondered what the circumstances were. Was he standing in front of the Capitol and inciting the crowd as he said it? But no; I discovered this report:
Multiple videos Reffitt took on and after 6 January, in which he discussed planning and bragged about participating in the riot, were used in evidence against him…
According to court papers, he had told fellow members of the militia that he planned to drag US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi out of the Capitol building by her ankles, “with her head hitting every step on the way down”.
So was this recording made by Reffitt himself? Was it before or after January 6th? If the recording wasn’t by Reffitt, who made it? Were FBI informants part of this group?
Reffitt himself said this, which I’m inclined to believe is the truth:
Prosecutors had sought a 15-year prison term, arguing Reffitt was “in a class all by himself” among Capitol riot defendants, and other rioters were “looking to him as their leader”.
But defence lawyers had argued the attack would have happened with or without him and noted he had no criminal history.
Having declined to testify at trial, Reffitt apologised in a brief statement before his sentencing, saying he had “an issue with just rambling and saying stupid [expletive]”.
At the trial, however, his wife and daughter spoke for a lesser sentence than the maximum, and this was cited by the judge as part of the reason he didn’t get the maximum:
His family, including his wife, sat in the court’s third row, and his daughter Peyton spoke on his behalf.
“He says a lot of things he doesn’t mean. His mental health is an issue,” she said, visibly emotional.
She added: “My father’s name wasn’t on the flags everyone was carrying that day.
“It was another man’s name,” she added in an apparent reference to former US President Donald Trump.
So the son seems to blame the father, and the daughter blames Trump. But the wife places the blame elsewhere:
His wife Nicole Reffitt told reporters the trial shows that “corrupt, evil politicians here in this city” are trying to undermine US civil liberties.
“This isn’t just about Guy Wesley Reffitt. This isn’t about just January 6th. This is about our liberties being stomped on,” she argued.
I can’t argue with that.
Those quotes are from the BBC, and funny thing, the Beeb seems to have given this man fairer coverage than the US papers I’ve seen. I noticed that the BBC also has this article, which dovetails with my own focus on this as a family conflict helped by the government to reach tragic proportions:
Those who know Reffitt say he is a big talker. So much so that his defence lawyer used it as his main argument for trying to have the case dismissed against Reffitt, who stood trial for bringing a handgun to the US Capitol during the 6 January riot.
But it was the volume of evidence of this bragging – detailed in texts, videos and audio – that convinced jurors of his guilt in a unanimous verdict in March after less than four hours of deliberations.
The DC jury was never going to do anything else.
More [emphasis mine]:
But Reffitt’s trial also showed how fissures dividing Americans have cracked wide open. It revealed how the deep political divide in the US has affected ordinary Americans and their families, often in a way that is emotionally wrenching and deeply personal. The divide has reached beyond the dinner table to pit family members against one another – in this case father against son – with far-reaching consequences.
For it was Reffitt’s son’s testimony against his father – whose political views he had long opposed – that formed a crucial part of the prosecution’s case.
Exactly as I had suspected. Some Red Guard action here by the son, who reported his father to the FBI prior to January 6th:
It was a string of messages from his father on Christmas Eve to the family text chain that alarmed Jackson. In them, the older Reffitt announced his intention to go to the nation’s capital “to rise up the way the Constitution was written”.
During his testimony, Jackson said that he reported his father to the FBI because he was worried about his plans.
Afterwards, said Jackson, he struggled with feelings of guilt for betraying his father: “I just felt gross.”
Not all that gross, however. The following does not surprise me at all [emphasis mine]:
“I started the fire,” Guy Reffitt told his family. He did not know that his son was secretly recording him on his mobile phone.
He threatened his son, warning him not to tell the authorities.
“If you turn me in, you’re a traitor,” his father told Jackson. “And traitors get shot.”
That was also probably recorded on Jackson’s cellphone, although the article doesn’t say. At any rate, it certainly was reported by Jackson:
Soon after, Jackson spoke with an FBI agent. Within days, his father was arrested.
On the day that his son testified against him, Reffitt walked into the courtroom with a swagger. But when Jackson took the stand, Guy’s demeanour changed. The big, burly man covered his face with his hands and doubled over in his chair, turning away from his son to hide his tears.
The two men looked strikingly similar that day. They both had the same lush locks – Guy kept his hair back, in a tight ponytail. Jackson’s hair fell loose, past his shoulders. They both wore a dark jacket, no tie, and a light-coloured shirt. Guy’s shirt was pale blue; Jackson’s was pink.
But the similarities ended there.
This is something that should never have come to this, and the government is shamefully exploiting a family dispute and using words said in anger in a long-lasting family dispute to imprison this man. They can state all they want to that it was his actions for which he’s being convicted, but it seems to me it is his angry words. He has no record and there is no report that he ever even laid a hand on anyone.
Here’s a little perspective from another family member [emphasis mine]:
The rift between the father and son was profound, eating away at their family. Guy’s older brother, Nathan Reffitt, a 50-year-old electrician, called Jackson a “snowflake” and overly sensitive.
“My nephew turned against his father,” Nathan told the BBC while attending his brother’s trial. “It’s sad that our country has come to this.”
Sad indeed.
His daughter backed that up:
Sarah described her father as a loving, gentle man. “Even the things he says that sounds like he would be violent,” she told the BBC, her voice trailing off. “He doesn’t hurt anyone.” She remembered that it was always their father the children would turn to if they would get into any trouble, because he was so forgiving.
Jackson seems to have, or to pretend to have, a bit of post-sentencing remorse:
Jackson, meanwhile, tweeted that it was “impossible to be happy” about the verdict. “My father could have possibly been home by now getting mental help if he took a plea deal,” he added.
There were other ways to have gotten help for both of you so it didn’t come to this. Involving the FBI was never going to be one of them.
I suggest you read the whole article. But I’ll let the daughter have the last word:
She said that a desire for one-upmanship fuelled her father; it caused him to not only swear like a sailor, but also drove him to Washington DC.
Specifically, she said, he wanted to show Jackson the kind of man that he is.
“He’s always trying to impress Jackson,” she said. “And he didn’t really impress anyone.”
“ Prosecutors claimed that because Reffitt was armed with a firearm, chose to go to trial and was a primary instigator in the riots, he deserved the longest sentence to date.”
Wait, you deserve a longer sentence, i.e., more punishment, for executing your constitutional right to a trial by jury?
Wow. A long post and a nice one. Seems like Guy had a bit of a Munchausen syndrome. Very sad.
I noticed that the charges sort of fit the deeds except for the obstruction of justice charge. Then I read the part where Guy threatens his son to keep silent. Was that the source of that charge?
So what I want to know is, if all of the reports about these denials of basic Constitutional rights, extremely long pretrial detentions, apparently deliberately miserable jail conditions, attacks on these detainees, and prosecutorial and judicial overreach are correct, what can be done–in a practical sense–to right these wrongs, and to “make whole” those who have been under threat of prosecution, detained, and sentenced if Republicans take both the House and Senate?
Impeach the judge handling these cases? Severely discipline and/or fire all the Federal officials involved?
Private legislation to compensate each and every one of these individuals?
P.S.–This travesty is certainly a good advertisement for a Republican President–a la Trump–to get every possible Federal judge he can confirmed.
P.S.S.–Other than being a chance to grandstand, Hearings don’t do a damn thing, if these Hearings are not followed thereafter by draconian punishments handed out to those who are demonstrated to have been guilty.
The behavior of the Stasi-like FBI/DOJ in the relentless persecution and prosecution (at the cost of no-one knows how many millions of dollars)of defendants from the “Fed-surrection” is reason enough that, should Republicans prevail in two weeks (how long will it take to count the votes this time, and how much chicanery from the Democrats will there be?), one of their priorities should be to begin the process of impeachment against the odious Garland, indirectly responsible as well for the inhumane conditions in DC’s Guantanamo, nor should one forget the sad tale of Matthew Perna, hounded to the point of suicide by the Department of (In)Justice.
By “the charges sort of fit the deeds,” I meant only by extreme extrapolation.
What a sad story! Gross over-charging and over-sentencing. He didn’t even go in the Capitol!
This man got himself in trouble for being a loud-mouthed big talker. Come to think of it, Trump has the same problem.
@rbj 1
Didn’t you know? That’s one of the reasons for the ‘throw every charge you can think of at the defendant’ school of prosecution, because it gives you something to bargain with in exchange for a plea deal.
Mind, I’d thought it was illegal to come right out and say that you’re doing this, and for the exact reason you mentioned: it’s an admission of an attempt to punish the defendant for exercising their constitutional rights.
Which makes this another example of the corruption of the justice system, as if it weren’t already, because lawyers (and, apparently, judges) no longer feel the need to even keep up the pretense of constitutional rule. Or at least as damning, are entirely unaware of the implication.
Sorta related…(to this madness)…but totally AGAINST the Narrative(TM)…
“EXCLUSIVE: Retired Police Sergeant, Oath Keeper Helped Rescue Capitol Police on Jan. 6…”—
https://www.theepochtimes.com/exclusive-retired-police-sergeant-oath-keeper-helped-rescue-capitol-police-on-jan-6-at-the-moment-the-world-needed-it_4811330.html
This man got himself in trouble for being a loud-mouthed big talker. Come to think of it, Trump has the same problem.
So does Biden.
Everything about the Jan 6th circus disgusts me, but this maybe worst of all. I have long since accepted DC is a sewer and maybe the British should have be a better job burning it. I have long since accepted this jurisdiction cannot give honest or unbiased verdicts in politically tinged cases. And of course the Swamp can be trusted to pursue its agenda ruthlessly. All of that is wretched and even evil, but it is at least fairly rational.
But Jackson Reffitt apparently heard that there was an opening for Pavlik Morozov figures and decided to step in. Especially given whatever beefs he had with the family. Unfortunately he is very much the model of the “New Man” the Progs want to create, “The Ones we have been waiting for.”
He will not be the last of his kind, unfortunately.
That son is as much a reckless loud-mouth as his father. The image of the father in court putting his face in his hands, with his son on the stand, implies that he recognizes what he has raised, and has realized, as only a parent can, that his son can’t see it yet.
The son: What can anyone say? He’s a proper little progressive hero of the State, isn’t he. He’s signed himself up for a miserable existence, once the impact of what he has wrought sinks in. Just wait ’till he slowly comes to realize how much like his father he is. There won’t be anywhere left for him to hide, then.
I’m confused on the gun. Was he wearing it at DC or not?
no he wasn’t, others left their guns, in the hotel in virginia, what insurrectionists,
It seems that the only one in his family with any sense is his wife.
Don, the story says he was wearing the gun in DC but didn’t enter the Capitol.
This is how you create martyrs.
Owen:
Except that very few people have heard of him.
“So does Biden.” Indeed he does have big talk and lying problems, worse than Trump, and now combined with not having any very clear idea of where he is.
do these prosecutors ever stop lying rhetorical, did they present any video evidence of Reffitt, that would tell you if he was packing or not, and the circumstances of his actions,
The kid hates his dad enough to request a fifteen year sentence.
He has helped destroy the family. Even those who would praise him would never trust him.
Child set up a gofund me, has 187,00.00 in it today.
And his photo wearing a pink pussy hat.
In Koba the Dread a account of a son who turned in his father who then was murdered by Stalinists was in turn killed by his grandfather and a uncle.
Very good book as we are rhyming the Russian Revolution
The longhaired punk thinks he gets to live on Elysium or in The Capitol of Panem when it’s all said & done.
He needs to understand though, that his dad may have mental health issues, but he was spot on about traitors. Revolution always turns on its own.
Back in 1987 my surfer buddy who went KKK was indicted on three weapons charges then sentenced to 10 years.
He was the real White Supremacist Deal on his holy mission to overthrow ZOG, our Zionist Occupied Government. He was batsh&t at that point and as I recall he was so deluded he defended himself in court.
Still — 10 years!
Yet Refitt got 7 1/2 years.
It’s like a variation of Gresham’s Law: “Bad money drives out good money.”
Silly white supremacism drives out sensible white supremacism.
Was he part of matthews outfit or some outlier cell
Any totalitarian regime can measure it’s success by it’s ability to turn children against their parent.
I assume the boy attends government school.
“Adolf Hitler, in inimitable and terrifying fashion, developed this maxim, stating baldly, He alone who owns the youth, gains the future, thereby demonstrating not just the importance of early education, but providing an object lesson in the attempts, through it, to manipulate and impose control. It is this same spirit that we are seeing at work today…”
https://parentpower.family/give-me-a-child-till-hes-7-and-i-will-show-you-the-man/
Now in retrosoect they killed unarmed protesters at least two maybe as many as five they tried to make them unpersons of worse they put hundreds of persons in the capitol gulag including a decorated navy lt commandet with security clearances (who they locked up for 40 days)
This is exactly the hell my parents fled from to avoid
There isn’t any possible way for Democrats to justify this. Of course, there aren’t any Democrats, politicians or voters, who care. Nasty, vicious, disgusting people do and support nasty, vicious, disgusting actions.
The son should repent and the father forgive.
This is the sentiment behind a bloc commitee they are called cdrs in nicaragua they were called turbas in venezuela they operate as colectivos
So he spoke these words to his own family inside his own home and goes to prison because of those words.
What next? Go to jail for telling your 12 year old he or she can’t have a sex change?
One mistake we made was giving self-rule and voting rights to residents of the capital district. The Founders saw the problems with that and they’ve come true.
“What next? Go to jail for telling your 12 year old he or she can’t have a sex change?”
Isn’t that—more or less—already the case?
IOW, isn’t that what the November election is, in large part, about?
Put another way, isn’t that why Youngkin is Governor of Virginia?
(Among many, many other things, certainly)…
YMMV.
– – – – – – – – –
“Any totalitarian regime can measure it’s success by it’s ability to turn children against their parent.”
Exactly right.
“Tomorrow belongs to us” could well be the Democratic Party’s slogan.
(Well, delusional—one hopes—slogan.)
Alas, “Biden” ‘s thought processes (such as they are) no doubt run along the lines of “Totalitarian governments have failed in the past but that’s only because they weren’t ‘done right’ “.
“We” aim to DO IT RIGHT!
“We” ‘re gonna invoke DEMOCRACY (even as we trample that out-date Constitution rag) and put a monument in honor of George Orwell in every public square, in every village, town and city. Gonna hang a huge banner with his funny mug on it from every tall building and tree.
Yep, Orwell’ll be our Founding Ideologue.
Get it?! Anyone who opposes “US” is an enemy of Democracy (heh)…
And anyone who’s against “US” is defying Orwell (heh, heh)…
We’ve thought it all out.
We’ve thought it all through.
We’re gonna do this thing RIGHT…
We’re gonna PROVE to everyone—to history, to the world—that OUR KIND OF TOTALITARIANISM WILL WORK.
Just watch us. You’ll see…
File under: The Thousand Year Democracy….
SOMETHING ELSE THAT MUST NOT BE FORGOTTEN:
“Alamein 1942, The Turn Of The Tide”—
https://blazingcatfur.ca/2022/10/24/alamein-1942-the-turn-of-the-tide/
Together with Stalingrad, this was the turning point (AKA “the end of the beginning”)….
Guys who run their mouths like the elder Reffit annoy me no end. Fortunately, I can usually arrange to be someplece else.
As to the son…is incurable leprosy painful enough? And it does without saying, the same should happen to the DoJ Stasi
this is another part of destroying men. loud talk is not a threat (tell the chick on the view). when you have destroyed all the men who will run to the sound of the guns?
“Prosecutors claimed that because Reffitt was armed with a firearm, chose to go to trial and was a primary instigator in the riots, he deserved the longest sentence to date.
So, insist on your constitutional rights, and you’ll be slammed harder.
Got it.
Prosecutors are not your friends.
Neither are windbags in blog comment sections who think they are the starring role of a movie.
Has anyone mentioned that the speech and comments by the president and attorney general should be fodder for an appeal?
History should regard the MAGA witch hunt and persecutions as a far worse abuse of power and shredding of constitutional rights than the Red Scares/McCarthyism.
Problem here is he was participating in a coup de ta or trying to violently overthrow our LEGALLY elected government. Tough shit BUCK!
Tom, so a demonstration that got out of hand, perhaps due to some agents provocateur, is a coup ? Our “Legally elected government?”
Thanks for letting us know what a Democrat thinks of this case.
Thanks for letting us know what a Democrat thinks of this case.
The Democratic electorate has been self-sorting into categories of ‘feckless’ and ‘vicious’. Category three (Glenn Greenwald, Bari Weiss, Alan Dershowitz) just lost one of its more prominent members in Tulsi Gabbard.
Tom Harper illustrates what I stated in another thread, that people on the Left actually believe that the J6 riot would overthrow the government. Once again I would like to see how. All I can think of is that it’s part of Trump derangement syndrome.
JFM
TDS requires the afflicted to actually believe.
The other cohort know better and are lying, hoping we might be convinced against reality,
We face the costanza effecf how do you rectify a high crime that has put us a road to world war 3 famine rolling blackouts
Tom Harper:
Begging the question, anyone?
Tom Harper:
Coup from a distance, is that a quantum insurrection, the entanglement of prosecutorial particles, or the “law for we and not for thee” principle?
Black holes of leftist justice.
@ Tom Harper > “coup de ta”
Try to get your accusations correct.
Coup d’état.
French for ‘stroke of state’
FWIW, by the authority of Wikipedia, the alleged coup was not a success.
Particularly since it had absolutely none of the characteristics of an actual coup.
@ Joseph Somsel > “What next? Go to jail for telling your 12 year old he or she can’t have a sex change?”
Since child abuse can be a criminal offense: yes.
https://notthebee.com/article/parents-in-indiana-have-lost-custody-of-their-kid-because-a-court-ruled-their-not-affirming-their-childs-gender-identity-was-abuse
However, since the Wokerati are always on about how much better national health care is than our private (heh) system, maybe they will follow the lead of the British.
https://hotair.com/jazz-shaw/2022/10/24/nhs-england-most-trans-kids-just-going-through-a-phase-n505410
In every (J6) case, the defendant’s real crime was not aborting an election. No, the real crime – and the DOJ says it right in the filings – is denying the outcome of the election. It was believing the wrong thing. It was not believing that a senile man who refused to leave his basement during the campaign somehow got more votes than any president in American history. If you refuse to believe that, you are now a felon.
Tucker Carlson: Are the wrong thoughts now illegal?