A man who admitted to entering the Capitol building on Jan. 6 was acquitted of charges brought against him on Wednesday afternoon after successfully arguing police let him through.
U.S. District Court Judge Trevor McFadden found Matthew Martin, an engineer from New Mexico, was found not guilty after a two-day bench trial. After being arrested in April 2021, Martin had been charged with entering and staying in an off-limits building, as well as disorderly and disruptive conduct.
“I saw no violence,” Martin said of the Jan. 6 Capitol riot during the trial, according to the outlet.
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Martin claimed during the trial that he had entered the building because he had believed that had permission from police, who allowed him to enter, according to Buzzfeed News.
Though prosecutors tried to argue Martin should have known better as he walked past “ARE CLOSED” signs and proceeded to record and encounter the chaos taking place, McFadden said during his decision that Martin’s “plausible” belief outweighed the arguments, according to the outlet.
Based on video footage McFadden had viewed, he said he wasn’t positive that Martin had been waved into the building by an officer. McFadden said his understanding of the footage was that Martin had waited to be allowed to enter the building while the office spoke with another person, and he entered the building after he tapped the officer causing him to lean back, according to the outlet.
Martin said during the trial that if he had to repeat that day over, he would stay away from the Capitol.
“I enjoyed everything else. I enjoyed the rally. It’s hard for me to say I regret coming to Washington, D.C.,” Martin said, according to the outlet.
McFadden stressed he was not criticizing the officers for how they handled the situation but pointed out that Martin’s interpretation of the events had been plausible.
McFadden found Couy Griffin, the co-founder of “Cowboys for Trump” guilty on March 17. Griffin was found guilty of illegally entering the Capitol grounds and became the second conviction in Jan. 6 cases.
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A federal grand jury found Guy Wesley Reffitt guilty on March 8 on two counts of civil disorder and one count of each relating to obstruction of an official proceeding, entering and remaining in a restricted building or on grounds with a firearm, and obstruction to justice. Reffitt was the first Jan. 6 defendant to go to trial.
