Judge considers home detention for Jan. 6 pipe bomb defendant

A federal judge said Tuesday he expects to decide within “the next day or two” whether Brian Cole Jr., the Virginia man accused of planting pipe bombs outside the Democratic and Republican National Committee headquarters on the eve of Jan. 6, 2021, should be released to home detention as he awaits trial.

“I’m going to take this matter under advisement,” U.S. Magistrate Judge Matthew J. Sharbaugh said at the close of a lengthy detention hearing. “I am sensitive to the urgency of this issue, and I do intend to get a ruling out expeditiously.”