A man convicted of charges related to the January 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol is getting out of jail early due to the Supreme Court taking up a case that may affect the sentences of hundreds of defendants.
Seefried, a man from Laurel, Delaware, was sentenced to three years in prison for a felony conviction of obstruction of an official proceeding, as well as 12 months and six months for misdemeanor charges. The Department of Justice said that Seefried, as well as his son Hunter, were among the first to enter the Capitol and were photographed carrying a Confederate flag while inside.
That obstruction charge is at the center of a case picked up by the Supreme Court.
That case, Fischer v. United States, challenges the DOJ’s use of the “obstruction of an official proceeding” charge, which has been used against January 6 defendants for allegedly disrupting the Electoral College certification. After the Supreme Court agreed to hear arguments in the case, some defendants filed for release pending the final ruling.
On Tuesday, Judge Trevor McFadden ruled that Seefried can be released from his prison sentence awaiting the court’s decision.
According to court documents, McFadden determined that Seefried does not pose a flight risk or a danger to his community and that his appeal was not “for the purpose of delay and raises a substantial question” that is likely to result in a reversal, new trial, a noncustodial sentence, or a custodial sentence that will have ended by the time the appeal is decided.
He noted that at least four Supreme Court justices are interested in taking up the challenge to the DOJ’s obstruction charge use and that if the court rules In Fischer’s favor, “it will almost certainly mean that Seefried’s analogous conduct” did not violate the obstruction law.
“In that case, Seefried will be left serving only his sentences for the four misdemeanor convictions. But, by the time his appeal has concluded, those custodial sentences will have likely concluded,” he wrote.
However, he wrote that his sentence for his misdemeanor charges would be over by May 31, 2024, and that he should, therefore, be released on or around that date, ruling that “one-year sentence is likely adequate.”
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Newsweek reached out to Seefried’s lawyer for comment via email.
The ruling comes just a week after a federal prosecutor warned that Jan. 6 defendants’ appeals based on Fischer could backfire.
U.S. Attorney Matthew Graves wrote in a court filing last week that if the Supreme Court sides with Fischer, the government could request consecutive, rather than concurrent, sentences for defendants’ misdemeanor charges, which in some cases may not necessarily result in a shorter prison sentence.
The filing states, “The calculus on resentencing would necessarily change, and a reversal of the 1512(c) conviction could increase the aggregate sentence on the remaining counts.”
McFadden addressed this concern in his ruling, criticizing federal prosecutors for relying on “the speculative claim that, without the felony conviction, the Court would convert Seefried’s concurrent sentences to consecutive ones.”
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