Left to right: Antony Vo and his mother inside U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Dept. of Justice/ Former President Donald Trump arrives at a rally in Washington, D.C. on Jan. 6, 2021./U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan, Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts via AP, File.
U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan — the same judge overseeing Donald Trump‘s pending election subversion trial — asked quite the incredulous question at the sentencing hearing this week of Antony Vo, an Indiana man convicted of storming the Capitol on Jan. 6 with his mother.
“Are you serious?” she asked.
The judge’s apparent frustration, she would later explain, came because Vo had “doubled down” on his remorselessness about his conduct even as he and his attorney sought leniency.
Vo was found guilty last September on four charges including entering or remaining in a restricted building or grounds; disorderly or disruptive conduct in a restricted building or grounds, violent entry or disorderly conduct in a Capitol building or grounds and parading, demonstrating or picketing in a Capitol building.
Chutkan ultimately sentenced him to nine months in prison.
The judge’s incredulity was sparked Wednesday after Vo’s defense attorney Carmen Hernandez argued that his attendance at a vigil outside a jail where Jan. 6 defendants are housed while he was on trial was not a violation of his terms of release. The judge had already ruled it was.
It was a “prayer vigil,” Hernandez insisted, according to a CBS report from inside the courtroom Wednesday.
But Chutkan, an Obama appointee, was unpersuaded after several fraught minutes of back and forth with the lawyer who had argued that a tipster had sent a photo of Vo singing in support of those in pretrial detention the jail.
This was “creepy,” Hernandez said, adding that she, as an immigrant to the U.S. — she is of Cuban descent — found it disturbing that someone would snap his photo outside the so-called “Freedom Corner” vigil and pass it off to authorities.
Chutkan, who was born in Jamaica, was unmoved. She too was an immigrant and said “it didn’t bother me.”
When Chutkan heard the term “Freedom Corner” in reference to the gathering outside the jail, she rolled her eyes and shook her head as prosecutors explained, The Associated Press reported.
“Is that what it’s called? Freedom Corner?” she remarked.
Several Jan. 6 defendants and Donald Trump alike have referred to those jailed or facing prosecution for the events at the Capitol as political prisoners or “hostages.” Trump specifically called them this at a rally in November and then this past March, as Law&Crime reported, he vowed to free them all if reelected, again referring to them as “hostages.”
Chutkan said those pretrial defendants are jailed because “they are dangerous, violent people.”
Vo, prosecutors said, has continued to refer to himself as a “Jan. 6 wrongful convict” in a social media bio online and wrote messages online after his trial was over that Chutkan ran a “kangaroo court.”
“I’ve been called worse,” Chutkan said Wednesday. “I’m thick-skinned.”
Vo had also said it was impossible to receive a fair trial in Washington, D.C., though it is worth noting that several defendants facing much greater charges and penalty than Vo, including defendants charged with seditious conspiracy, were acquitted by jurors in the nation’s capital.
Specific to the Indiana man, Chutkan had been somewhat permissive of him post-trial; on one hand, she had allowed him to stay free pending sentencing but on another, she rejected his request to travel to Cancun for vacation with family before learning his fate.
She reminded Vo of this at his sentencing hearing and also remarked on a memory that stuck out to her from the trial. She remembered how he had been smiling at the defense table as a police officer testified to jurors about the horrors he experienced as the mob overwhelmed the Capitol.
via FBI court filing
Before being sentenced, Vo said he was sorry for what had happened and that he “wasn’t there to overthrow any democratic process or anything.” As Chutkan delivered the sentence, Vo reportedly raised his hand to interject but he was not permitted to address the court again.
“I don’t believe Mr. Vo thinks the law applies to him,” Chutkan said but added that she believed Vo could “come back from this.”
Vo had tried several times prior to Wednesday to delay or stay his sentencing, which has been a lengthy process; notably, his plea hearing in March 2022 veered off course after he refused to admit to a key element of one offense.
As Law&Crime previously reported, Vo used social media including Facebook and Instagram to effectively catalog his trip to Washington, D.C., on Jan. 6 and then later, his presence at the Capitol. Snapping photos and shooting off texts, Vo wrote in one message: “My mom and I helped stop the vote count for a bit.”
“President [Trump] asked me to be here tomorrow so I am with my mom LOL,” he wrote a day earlier. Vo also claimed police let him and others into the Capitol willingly.
Per a minute entry of proceedings, Chutkan assessed a fine of $1,000 on Vo. He has the right to appeal.
Ultimately, Hernandez appeared miffed at the sentence and even told Chutkan she was being overly harsh and that she was an “outlier” among other judges who had sentenced Jan. 6 defendants.
“I may be an outlier, as Ms. Hernandez suggests. I don’t necessarily think I am,” Chutkan said.
Federal prosecutors had asked for 11 months.
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