A QAnon adherent charged in connection with the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol tried to bypass his attorney in court on Friday in an effort to try to get out of jail.
He got no further with it than his lawyer did earlier this year.
Last September, U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly had revoked Douglas Jensen‘s bond in September after he admitted to watching a “Cyber Symposium regarding the recount of the presidential election” led by MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell. A pretrial services officer had discovered Jensen in August in his garage watching the symposium on a far-right video-sharing website.
The violation came less than one month after Jensen was released from custody. He had been in custody since his arrest days after the Capitol siege. Kelly, a Trump appointee, agreed to grant Jensen’s bond request in July. One of the conditions of Jensen’s pretrial release to home detention was that he avoid the use of any electronic device that can access the internet.
In a Friday court hearing, Jensen, appearing by video from jail, asked to speak to the judge directly. Kelly granted Jensen’s request, but his attempted heart-to-heart with the court was bungled from the start. Jensen was unable to unmute himself. Jensen’s attorney, Christopher Michael Davis, spoke on his client’s behalf.
“[Jensen] wanted to apologize for having disregarded his conditions of release and he wanted to ask Your Honor to reconsider allowing him to remain in home detention pending trial,” Davis said.
Kelly, who rejected Jensen’s motion for reconsideration on the bond revocation in January, declined Jensen’s verbal request on Friday, but he didn’t foreclose the possibility of eventually releasing him.
“I have already—based on the motion your attorney filed—denied reconsidering that,” Kelly said. “[But] there are standards that govern motions for reconsideration, and if your attorney files a motion that meets that standard I’ll certainly consider it.”
“But I appreciate your apology,” Kelly added.
At the time, Jensen conceded that he had used his daughter’s iPhone to access Lindell’s live-stream. He compared the violation in a defense filing to a drug relapse.
Kelly also denied Jensen’s motion to dismiss on Friday. Like several other Jan. 6 defendants, Jensen was trying to get a federal obstruction charge that carries a potential 20-year prison sentence dropped from the case.
As he and at least six of his D.C. Circuit colleagues have already done, Kelly denied the motion.
“Judges in this district have rejected to date all of those challenges,” Kelly said.
Jensen has been identified as a leader of the mob that chased Officer Eugene Goodman up two flights of stairs in the Capitol building. Goodman is credited with leading the crowd away from the Senate entrance before it was sealed.
Jensen’s trial has been set for Sept. 19.
Lindell, an ardent supporter of Donald Trump, has continued to push the demonstrably false claim that fraud in the 2020 presidential election resulted in Trump losing to Joe Biden. Indeed, it was after Trump’s so-called “Stop the Steal” rally in Washington on Jan. 6 that hundreds of his supporters overran police at the Capitol and breached the building in an effort to stop Congress from certifying election results.
[Image via Saul Loeb/Getty Images.]
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