Attorney Alan Dershowitz has taken on a Jan. 6 client after spending a year on the sidelines speaking out about government overreach and constitutional rights violations.
His deciding factor was the fact that one defendant was a law school student whose diploma was withheld and who has been prohibited from taking the bar exam because he has five counts hanging over his head from entering the Capitol.
“I said I disagreed with him fundamentally [about Jan. 6], and he said, ‘I could care less,’” Dershowitz told the Washington Examiner. “He made a persuasive point to me: He graduated from law school, was denied admission to the bar, and I generally take First Amendment cases like this.”
The new client is Brady Knowlton, 41, who was a fisherman a decade ago and starred in several episodes of Catfishin’ Kings on Animal Planet. He was also a financial consultant in the Texas energy sector but now lives in Utah.
Dershowitz, a Harvard Law School professor emeritus, has a soft spot for law students and didn’t want Knowlton’s life ruined over the incident. So he took the case but would not say if he had been approached by others in the past.
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Dershowitz wasted no time in producing a narrated video of that infamous day, which resulted in 816 people being charged. Some of the footage is new, added to Justice Department clips released previously. It highlights what the officers were doing, stopping at key points to explain what is happening.
The video states that 250 protesters entered through a side door in the upper terrace and that Capitol police officers can be seen welcoming some of them. One of the visitors was Knowlton, who held up his cellphone to film the event. He went into the lobby, Rotunda, and Senate chamber before leaving.
The footage itself is silent, but the body language of the officers clearly tells the story, Dershowitz argued. He is demanding the release of audio under a federal law that requires prosecutors to turn over all exculpatory evidence to the defense.
“There is no crime. The police invited these people to come in and not do any damage and leave when they are told to leave,” Dershowitz said. “It seems clear from the pictures on the video that this is the message being sent. The audio will confirm what we see on the tapes.”
The most important thing, according to case law, is what the defendant reasonably believes, Dershowitz said.
“They reasonably believe they have been welcomed in,” he said.
The five-minute video shows officers allowing five people to leave through upper-level terrace doors. Shortly after, a number of protesters enter. The officers allow them to pass, and one officer even holds the door open.
“At 2:44 p.m., a police officer in the bottom of the screen can be seen speaking to the officers in front of him and pulling them away, indicating to the crowd that they are allowed to enter,” the narrator says. “The officers then turn their backs to the crowd, which indicates that they did not possess fear of the protesters. The officers then escort the crowd into the interior of the Capitol.”
The crowd appears peaceful as they file into the Capitol and mill about, mingling with officers. The video ends with officers closing the doors at 2:47 p.m. as the police presence increases and no one else enters.
“There is a double standard of justice. The people on the West Coast did far more damage,” said Dershowitz, referring to Black Lives Matter and antifa protesters involved in arson and looting following the George Floyd verdict. “But because the Jan. 6 people are supporting a cause the Justice Department wasn’t in support of, they are applying a double standard.”
Dershowitz is a Democrat who voted for President Joe Biden and doesn’t believe that the election should be overturned. But he has continuously supported underdogs in legal fights, one example being when he joined O.J. Simpson’s legal “Dream Team.”
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“He is such a nice man, a dedicated guy. He believed in what he was doing,” Dershowitz said of Knowlton, who is out of custody awaiting trial.
As for the rest of the Jan. 6 detainees, Dershowitz said they should be released.
“That’s clearly a mistake,” he said.
