Jan. 6 defendant William Pope says prosecutors are ‘intentionally concealing information about this Antifa seditious conspiracy.’
A group of self-identified Antifa supporters who wanted “civil war and revolution” on Jan. 6 sought online blueprints for federal buildings so they could firebomb them and discussed using a Roman legion formation to attack police lines, a Sept. 15 court filing alleges.
Defendant William Pope of Topeka, Kansas, included the information in a renewed U.S. District Court push (pdf) to compel federal prosecutors to produce all bodycam footage and video filmed by Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) undercover officers on Jan. 6, 2021.
Mr. Pope, 37, publisher of the news website Free State Kansas, was at the Capitol on Jan. 6, covering the protest and subsequent violence.
Federal prosecutors charged him with civil disorder, corruptly obstructing an official proceeding, entering and remaining in a restricted building or grounds, disorderly and disruptive conduct in a restricted building or grounds, impeding ingress or egress in a restricted building or grounds, disorderly conduct in a Capitol building, impeding passage through the Capitol grounds or buildings, and parading, demonstrating or picketing in a Capitol building. He faces a July 2024 trial.
According to Pope’s latest motion, MPD officers made a traffic stop at 10:15 a.m. on Jan. 6 of a vehicle containing three Antifa operatives: Jonathan Kelly, Logan Grimes, and Dempsey Mikula.
“Undercover officers who stopped their vehicle said they had received reports that the individuals were carrying weapons,” Mr. Pope wrote. “No footage of this incident has been produced by the government in discovery. However, Kelly live-streamed part of the police stop to Facebook.”
Mr. Kelly refused to allow police to search his vehicle, so they sent for a dog to sniff the vehicle for contraband.
“A little over ten minutes into Kelly’s livestream, a team of uniformed MPD officers showed up to replace the undercover police,” Mr. Pope wrote. “These uniformed officers wore body cameras and instructed Kelly, Grimes, and Mikula to get out of the vehicle while they waited for the dog to arrive.”
At least two of the undercover officers who made the traffic stop were wearing colorful bracelets that identified them as members of MPD’s Electronic Surveillance Unit (ESU), which gathered intelligence and shot video around Washington and at the Capitol on Jan. 6.
Nearly 30 members of the Electronic Surveillance Unit were assigned to duty on Jan. 6, 2021, some of whom were gathering evidence on crowd activity. Members wore a special band on their left wrist to identify themselves as part of the unit, according to the MPD’s 96-page Jan. 6 action plan.
