A federal judge says QAnon Shaman, Jacob Chansley, "blatantly lied" when claiming police waved the pro-Trump mob through open doors at the US Capitol.
After ordering Mr Chansley to remain in custody pending trial, senior judge Royce Lamberth released two videos debunking claims made during an interview on CBS's 60 Minutes program, according to Law&Crime.
In a 32-page opinion on 8 March, Mr Lamberth outlines the newly-released videos showing rioters breaking through windows as the defendant walks through an adjacent doorway, identified by his distinct horns.
"The government's video shows that defendant blatantly lied during his interview with 60 Minutes+ when he said that police officers waved him into the building," Mr Lamberth wrote.
"Further, this video confirms that defendant did not, as defence counsel claims, enter the building" contemporaneously with the exiting by Capitol Police." […] Nor did he enter, as defence counsel represents, in the 'third wave' of the breach. To the contrary, he quite literally spearheaded it."
Mr Chansley appeared in an interview with 60 Minutes in February, that the former president’s refusal to pardon him and other rioters had “wounded” him, although he remained supportive of Donald Trump.
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“My actions were not an attack on this country. I sang a song,” Mr Chansley said, while admitting that he “regretted” breaking into the Capitol. “That’s a part of Shamanism, it was about creating positive vibrations in a sacred chamber [the Senate]”.
Mr Lamberth said the appearance 60 Minutes was evidence Mr Chansley did not understand the severity of his actions and his "detachment from reality".
He also rebuked Mr Chansley's lawyer, Albert Watkins, for the press campaign,
“Such media appearances are undoubtedly conducive to defence counsel’s fame. But they are not at all conducive to an argument that the only way defence counsel could privately communicate with his client is if the defendant were temporarily released," Judge Lamberth wrote.
"Given defence counsel's decision to use what could have been a confidential videoconference on a media publicity stunt, that argument is so frivolous as to insult the court's intelligence."
