The Supreme Court ruled 6–3 on June 28 in favor of Jan. 6 defendant Joseph Fischer, a former police officer charged under an accounting law after he briefly entered the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
The new ruling is expected to make it more difficult for the federal government to prosecute those charged in connection with the Capitol security breach that occurred as Congress was attempting to finalize the 2020 presidential election results.
Concurring in the judgment were Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Ketanji Brown Jackson. Justice Jackson wrote a separate concurring opinion.
Justices Amy Coney Barrett, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan dissented.
The court performed “textual backflips to find some way–any way—to narrow the reach” of the federal statute under which Mr. Fischer was charged, Justice Barrett wrote in her dissenting opinion.
The case was being closely watched because the Supreme Court’s decision could affect hundreds of Jan. 6 prosecutions, including the Jan. 6-related case against former President Donald Trump.
Mr. Fischer, from Jonestown, Pennsylvania, was indicted on several counts following the Capitol breach on Jan. 6, 2021, including obstructing an official proceeding under Enron-era obstruction law 18 U.S. Code Section 1512(c). Convictions under the section can lead to 20 years in prison.
The wording of 1512(c) is focused on documentation and ensuring it is made available for official proceedings.
Section 1512(c) states: “Whoever corruptly (1) alters, destroys, mutilates, or conceals a record, document, or other object, or attempts to do so, with the intent to impair the object’s integrity or availability for use in an official proceeding; or (2) otherwise obstructs, influences, or impedes any official proceeding or attempts to do so, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both.”
The charge relates to the alleged obstruction of the congressional certification of the 2020 presidential election results, a proceeding that paved the way for the inauguration of President Joe Biden two weeks later.
Mr. Fischer argued that he should not have been charged under section 1512(c), an evidence-tampering provision of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act aimed at curbing wrongdoing on Wall Street.
The legislation came in the wake of fraud-related scandals at Enron Corp. and other major corporations in the early 2000s. Enron employed dubious accounting practices to conceal falling profits and exaggerate earnings, and its employees reportedly began destroying paperwork when they learned that indictments were in the works.
Some defendants who arrived at the Capitol after Congress was evacuated on Jan. 6, 2021, were also charged with obstructing an official proceeding. Several defendants have argued unsuccessfully at trial that they couldn’t have obstructed Congress because they weren’t present in the Capitol until after lawmakers left the complex.
Mr. Fischer also says he left the complex before Congress attempted to move forward with certifying the election and was in Maryland at the time of the security breach.
Majority Opinion
In the majority opinion, Chief Justice Roberts wrote that proving a violation under Section 1512(c)(2) requires the government to establish that the defendant “impaired” or attempted to impair the availability of a record, document, or other things used in an official proceeding.Mr. Fischer was charged with seven counts of violating various laws, but only Count Three, which pertains to obstruction, was before the Supreme Court, the chief justice wrote.
Among the other charges, which remain pending, are that he forcibly assaulted a federal officer, entered and remained in a restricted building, and engaged in disorderly and disruptive conduct in the U.S. Capitol. Those counts carry maximum penalties ranging from six months to eight years in prison.
In federal district court, Mr. Fischer moved to dismiss the obstruction count, arguing that he didn’t interfere with access to any documents. His lawyer said the legal provision “criminalizes only attempts to impair the availability or integrity of evidence.” That court granted the motion, finding the scope of the statute only applied if the defendant had taken “some action with respect to a document, record, or other object.”
However, a divided panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit reversed and remanded the case to the lower court.
The problem is the federal government used a “novel interpretation” of the statute that sweeps too broadly. That interpretation “would criminalize a broad swath of prosaic conduct, exposing activists and lobbyists alike to decades in prison,” the chief justice wrote.
As the government acknowledged during oral arguments, this could lead to a “peaceful protester” being charged under Section 1512(c)(2) and facing 20 years in prison, he said.
“And the Government would likewise have no apparent obstacle to prosecuting under (c)(2) any lobbying activity that ‘influences’ an official proceeding and is undertaken ‘corruptly.’”
Such peculiar results underscore how implausible the interpretation is, he wrote.
The Supreme Court vacated the judgment of the D.C. Circuit and returned the case to that court “for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.”
Justice Jackson joined the majority opinion and filed her own concurring opinion.
She wrote she agreed with the majority that Section 1512(c)(2) “does not reach ‘all forms of obstructive conduct.’”
Although the “peaceful transfer of power is a fundamental democratic norm, and those who attempted to disrupt it in this way inflicted a deep wound on this Nation,” the current case is “not about the immorality of those acts” and is focused on a narrower question.
In her dissenting opinion, Justice Barrett wrote that the majority “atextually” narrowed the law and “failed to respect the prerogatives of the political branches.”
“There is no getting around it: Section 1512(c)(2) is an expansive statute. Yet Congress, not this Court, weighs the ‘pros and cons of whether a statute should sweep broadly or narrowly,’” she wrote, quoting United States v. Rodgers (1984).
“Once Congress has set the outer bounds of liability, the Executive Branch has the discretion to select particular cases to prosecute within those boundaries,” Justice Barrett added.
Justices Sotomayor and Kagan joined the dissent.
