Left: Attorney Norman Pattis (Law&Crime). Right: Joseph Biggs (via FBI court filing).
Add Proud Boys member and Florida man Joseph Biggs — convicted of seditious conspiracy and sentenced to one of the longest prison terms for his role in the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol, to the growing list of felons seeking a pardon from President-elect Donald Trump.
U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly, a Trump appointee, last year sentenced the 40-year-old Biggs to 17 years behind bars after a jury convicted him of seditious conspiracy, among other charges, in May 2023. Now his camp is hoping the prison sentence will soon end with Trump headed back to the White House.
Biggs’ attorney Norm Pattis, known for representing Alex Jones and Infowars employees, told Orlando Fox affiliate WOFL that he is writing Trump a letter urging him to give his client a pardon. Pattis said releasing Biggs from prison is in the public’s interest.
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“The notion that Mr. Biggs is some sort of domestic terrorist that should sit behind bars for 17 years is a chilling message to everyone,” Pattis told the TV station. “And that is you ought not to write patriotic hyperbole and then attend a protest, because if you do, an ambitious prosecutor is going to turn your words into circumstantial evidence of intent to commit a crime. And that’s just un-American.”
Pattis told the Daytona Beach News-Journal that Biggs is “excited and hopeful about the prospects of a pardon.” As the News-Journal pointed out, Biggs was confident about receiving a pardon even before Trump’s election. He expressed that sentiment in a jailhouse interview with Infowars last year. MSNBC’s “All In with Chris Hayes” played a clip of the interview.
Oh, I know he’ll pardon us. I believe that with all my heart. You know, the thing is, is hopefully getting him, you know, for him to be able to get into the position where he can at least be, I think, on the ballot to run right ’cause … but I do believe that Donald J. Trump will pardon us and he should. We didn’t do anything. You know, we’re his supporters. We went there like he asked
Trump has said he would pardon Jan. 6 defendants but has not been specific on who among the roughly 1,500 rioters arrested would receive one. He said on his social media platform that he would pardon “many of them” but not the ones who “got out of control.”
Since the election, many Jan. 6 defendants have filed requests to delay hearings on their cases until after Trump is inaugurated on Jan. 20.
“Ultimately, my jury was the entire American public, and they voted for a mandate to set me free,” wrote one alleged rioter from Kansas, Will Pope, in a motion filed Friday. “If there should be a jury trial in my case, it should happen after emotions have had time to cool.”
The Justice Department wasn’t having it with that excuse.
“No continuance is warranted here,” prosecutors said in an opposition filing on Saturday. “At this time, the defendant’s expectation of a pardon is mere speculation, and the Court should proceed as it would in any other prosecution.”
FILE – In this Jan. 6, 2021, file photo, Proud Boys including Joseph Biggs, front left, walks toward the U.S. Capitol in Washington, in support of President Donald Trump. With the megaphone is Ethan Nordean, second from left. Outside pressures and internal strife are roiling two far-right extremist groups after members were charged in the attack on the U.S. Capitol. Former President Donald Trump’s lies about a stolen 2020 election united an array of right-wing supporters, conspiracy theorists and militants on Jan. 6. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster, file)
Others have tried to slip in under special counsel Jack Smith’s decision to call it quits in the Washington, D.C., criminal case against Trump, as a sitting U.S. president cannot be prosecuted.
But the DOJ, at least under President Joe Biden, has signaled that prosecution of individual Jan. 6 defendants will move forward.
“The defendant’s citation to Special Counsel Jack Smith’s motion to vacate a briefing schedule in the matter of United States v. Trump, is inapposite,” DOJ prosecutors argued in a filing opposing accused Jan. 6 rioter Stephen Baker‘s request to continue his case — a motion that U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper, a Barack Obama appointee, promptly denied.
As Law&Crime has previously reported, the seditious conspiracy charge is widely considered to be the most serious charge against rioters who stormed the Capitol building on Jan. 6. The mob, spurred on by then-President Trump’s repeated false statements that fraud affected the outcome of the 2020 presidential election, overwhelmed police trying to beat back the crowd and violently breached the building as Congress had begun to certify Biden’s 2020 electoral win. Lawmakers were forced to evacuate or shelter in place for several harrowing hours.
Biggs, along with other members of the right-wing Proud Boys and Oath Keepers groups, were accused of being among the first people to illegally enter the Capitol and the chief organizers of the riot. At his sentencing hearing, Biggs reportedly told the judge that he has spent a lot of time thinking about the kind of person he wants to be and that the only organization he wants to be a part of going forward is his daughter’s PTA. He also said he’s tired of being in the so-called “Patriot Pod” at the Washington jail where several Jan. 6 defendants are being held.
Biggs and co-defendant Zachary Rehl were convicted of seditious conspiracy, obstruction of an official proceeding of Congress, and other crimes in connection with the Jan. 6 attack. Rehl received a 15-year sentence. Biggs is currently at a federal prison in Alabama.
Marisa Sarnoff and Chris Perez contributed to this report.
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