Federal prosecutors described David Dempsey as “one of the most violent rioters” during the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.
The Van Nuys man used flagpoles, metal crutches and broken pieces of furniture as he stormed the building, injuring both police and other insurrectionists, according to court documents. He “viciously assaulted and injured police officers” for more than an hour “during one of the most violent stretches of time, at the scene of the most violent confrontations,” prosecutors wrote.
In August, he was sentenced to 20 years in prison after pleading guilty to assaulting a law enforcement officer with a dangerous weapon and breaching the seat of Congress.
But on Tuesday, after President Trump granted sweeping pardons or commutations to everyone convicted of Jan. 6 offenses — more than 1,500 people — Dempsey was released, having served less than 3½ years, officials confirmed.
Other Jan. 6 defendants — whom Trump called “hostages” — were also released across the country, based on Justice Department referrals of Trump’s orders to the Bureau of Prisons.
“People are being released by the minute, it seems,” said Amy Collins, a Washington-based attorney who represents several Jan. 6 defendants, including Dempsey. “The DOJ actually seems to be jumping on board pretty quickly.”
Collins declined to comment on Dempsey’s case, but said the pardon process — after years of litigation, plea bargaining and trials — has been “surreal” for the defendants and their attorneys alike.
“The fact that Trump kept his word and it has a direct result in our case, that’s a pretty big deal,” she said. “It’s such a unique situation.”
The sudden release of so many Jan. 6 offenders marked a stunning end to years of grueling, costly work by federal prosecutors to identify, track down, prosecute and see sentenced hundreds of Trump loyalists and MAGA hard-liners who stormed and attacked the Capitol in a failed attempt to keep Trump illegitimately in power after he lost to Joe Biden in the 2020 election.
By the end of last year, the investigation had become the largest in the history of the Justice Department, which said it had charged 1,561 people in total, 590 of them with assaulting, resisting, impeding or obstructing law enforcement officers. It said nearly 980 had pleaded guilty, 210 others had been found guilty at trial, and 645 had been sentenced to at least some time behind bars.
The Justice Department under Biden cast the prosecution effort as a vital check on the kind of political violence that was on display that day. It said 140 police officers had been assaulted, and millions of dollars in damages incurred.
However, Trump never saw it that way. On the campaign trail he repeatedly lied about what happened, downplayed the severity of the attack, and suggested those charged were being wrongly held as political prisoners. He promised he would issue pardons, but gave contradicting statements about whether he would pardon everyone charged or a narrower cohort.
Even within his own Republican Party, Trump faced resistance to pardons for the worst offenders, such as those who violently attacked police officers. Earlier this month, now-Vice President JD Vance told Fox News that if someone committed violence on Jan. 6, “obviously you shouldn’t be pardoned, and there’s a little bit of a gray area there.”
And yet, within hours of being inaugurated, Trump had pardoned the vast majority of Jan. 6 defendants, including many convicted of violent acts. And he had commuted the sentences of the rest — 14 of the most high-profile defendants, including militia leaders charged with seditious conspiracy against the government — to time served, allowing their release from prison as well.
The orders drew surprise from both sides of the political aisle, and outrage from liberal leaders and law enforcement officials who were injured in the assault.
In an interview on CNN, Former Metropolitan Police Officer Michael Fanone, who suffered a heart attack after a rioter shocked him with a stun gun during the insurrection, blasted Trump’s decision to pardon the individuals who assaulted him and other officers. He also criticized those who voted to return Trump to office despite Trump’s promising to do just that on the campaign trail.
“I have been betrayed by my country, and I have been betrayed by those that supported Donald Trump,” said Fanone, a 20-year law enforcement officer. “Whether you voted for him because he promised these pardons or for some other reason, you knew this was coming — and here we are.”
Sen. Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.), a member of the House committee that investigated the insurrection, said Trump had given “a literal ‘get out of jail free’ card to rioters who committed horrific violence in his name.”
Schiff said the orders were not “just forgiveness for their crimes,” but “a permission structure to do it again.”
Both Fanone and Schiff were among those pardoned by President Biden earlier Monday, not because they had been charged with any crime, but for fear that Trump would seek retribution against them for holding the Jan. 6 attackers to account.
Among those released from prison were former Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio and Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes — with Rhodes’ sentence of 18 years in prison and Tarrio’s sentence of 22 years in prison, both for seditious conspiracy, immediately ended.
Rhodes’ sentence was commuted. James Lee Bright, his attorney, expressed gratitude on X, writing, “A pardon was prayed for, but better than prison while he appeals.”
Nayib Hassan, Tarrio’s attorney, thanked Trump in a statement, saying his client had received a “full and complete pardon.” Hassan called it a “pivotal moment” in Tarrio’s life and “a turning point for our nation.”
Other Californians besides Dempsey were also among those pardoned and freed.
Dyke Huish, a defense attorney, said Tuesday that he was awaiting a certificate of pardon for his client Russell Taylor, who was accused of being part of the Three Percenters militia group, and of coordinating travel from California to Washington, D.C., to block Biden’s win.
Taylor, who prosecutors said wore body armor and carried a knife and a hatchet as he helped others overrun police lines, initially faced a much stiffer sentence but received leniency after agreeing to testify against Alan Hostetter, a former La Habra police chief and member of the so-called DC Brigade.
Taylor was sentenced to six months of home detention after pleading guilty, and placed on probation set to end in 2027. Huish said such restrictions are “over now,” but that he has advised his client to await the certificate.
He said he would still seek a dismissal of Taylor’s charges, because a pardon was not the same as an expungement.
Huish declined to make Taylor available for an interview, but said Taylor “is very happy that President Trump kept his promise and that he is now free to return to his full life without his court imposed probation.”
Joe Allen, who represented several Jan. 6 defendants, including one from California, said that while he was not surprised that Trump issued pardons, he is “a little surprised about the breadth” of them.
“I thought that there were certain offenders who [pleaded] guilty or who were found guilty [of] violent crimes that maybe he would not pardon, because on the other end of those violent crimes are law enforcement officers,” Allen said.
He also believes that many people never should have been charged. His clients “have lost so much” in the process — one client from Tennessee missed the birth of his child — and the pardons give them “their rights back,” he said.
But he also questioned how Trump’s pardons and a cluster of others by Biden earlier Monday — for officials who had investigated Jan. 6 and others who had drawn the ire of Trump and members of his family — might harm perceptions of the American justice system.
“I gotta think of what other countries are thinking when they see our leadership conducting themselves this way,” he said. “It’s almost like the embarrassment of mom and dad fighting in front of the kids.”
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