Government

Capitol Rioter Complains About Being Rudely Ejected From Insurrection By Police

Feds' version of events is ever so slightly different.

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(Photo by Samuel Corum/Getty Images)

In today’s episode of “You Tried It,” Capitol Riot defendant Daniel Egtvedt asks the court to let him out of jail pending trial for invading the Capitol and assaulting a police officer, so he can go back to his unblemished “history of being a law-abiding citizen for the last 57 years.” The court should please ignore the fact that the Maryland State Police had to intervene last month to prevent Mr. Egtvedt from physically preventing his brother from taking their elderly mother to get a COVID shot. Just a funny little misunderstanding, your honor!

Also, defense counsel would appreciate it if the court would disregard the government’s version of events, i.e. the one bolstered by video, still images, and multiple officers’ sworn statements, and instead accept the defendant’s account of what went down.

For instance, prosecutors would have the court believe that Mr. Egtvedt assaulted a female officer after she instructed him to leave the Capitol building.

Not so, says Mr. Egtvedt. In fact, he was “violently assaulted by police officers, not once, but twice,” during which “his head ricocheted off a marble column and he fell to the ground” where he “remained unconscious and motionless for several seconds, if not minutes.”

The government claims that after being subdued, Mr. Egtvedt “said he was not going to leave and splayed out his arms and legs while lying on his back in an effort to prevent law enforcement from picking him up,” and when they finally managed to wrestle him out the door, he immediately assaulted the very same female officer again as he tried to re-enter.

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Or, as the defendant put it, “Mr. Egtvedt was picked up and tossed through the doors by two police officers as if he were a rowdy patron being kicked out of a nightclub.” Only, instead of a nightclub, it’s the seat of American government. And instead of two police officers, it’s five because he’s 6’2″ and 320 lbs. Same difference.

Mr. Egtvedt’s counsel describes him as a patriotic citizen, simply exercising his First Amendment rights: “He never encouraged misconduct by others, but encouraged them to come protest. He never damaged federal property, never threatened law enforcement and had nothing to say about the Electoral College. ”

Although, as the government notes, he gave multiple livestream interviews during the January 6 invasion in which he exhorted viewers to join him, saying, “Everybody, if you’re seeing this, come down here now. We’re not backing away; this is our house,” and “We are in treasonous situations here. People please come down to the United States Capitol, right now.”

But according to, uh, John Locke, that’s the cops’ fault for giving him a concussion.

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Notwithstanding that others find the Defendant’s beliefs to be irrationally based, it is clear that the he was not acting out of criminal intent. In the heat of the moment, after you’ve likely suffered a concussion, you may forgo reason and listen to those around you. It is easy to substitute passion for reason. Many people can’t abstractly reason in different circumstances and this situation is no exception. When people cannot apply reason to a concept, they stop reasoning. People do this all the time: you can give them a reasoning process, and especially if they are suffering from a head injury, they can’t apply it rationally. See John Locke, An Essay  Concerning Human Understanding (1690).

And, the pièce de résistance, Mr. Egtvedt demands to be let out of jail because of COVID.

“He has not taken the vaccine for COVID-19 which poses an additional risk to his health,” his lawyer murmurs with concern, while noting that “Reviewing the evidence alongside a client during the COVID-19 pandemic is a near impossibility because undersigned counsel cannot travel to the jail and because of the protective order in place.”

Please disregard the fact that Mr. Egtvedt told the cops in Maryland that the vaccine was deliberately designed to kill a bunch of people as “population control.” Also that he seems to regard the federal government as an unlawful authority, writing to Garrett County that he’d be a “political prisoner in a foreign land” if he were handed over to the feds. Just take Mr. Egtvedt’s word for it that it’s too dangerous for him to stay in jail, and he’ll abide by every condition of bail if released on his own recognizance.

Here are some photos of Mr. Egtvedt in happier days.

It’s not clear whether Mr. Egtvedt will be granted release pending trial. But it’s a pretty safe bet he won’t be invited to the White House Christmas party with John Voight in 2021.

US v. Egtvedt [Docket via Court Listener]

Elizabeth Dye lives in Baltimore where she writes about law and politics.

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