WA Jan. 6 defendant sentenced to time served for unrelated crime

A Pasco man accused of participating in the Jan. 6, 2021, riot on the U.S. Capitol was sentenced Thursday to time served and three years of supervised release for weapons charges unrelated to the Capitol attack.

Taylor Taranto was pardoned earlier this year by President Donald Trump for his alleged involvement in the riot.

In May, Taranto was convicted of making a hoax threat to bomb a government building in Maryland while in Washington, D.C., in June 2023. He was arrested the same day near former President Barack Obama’s home in D.C. after allegedly livestreaming himself making threats against several people. Investigators found two guns and 500 rounds of ammunition inside his van, according to federal court filings.

The Washington Post reported Wednesday that the Department of Justice placed the two prosecutors on Taranto’s case on leave a day after they filed a sentencing memorandum in the case that called the Jan. 6 attack a riot” carried out by a “mob.” The attorneys were told they were being suspended hours after filing the document, The Post reported.

That same day, two new Department of Justice attorneys were assigned to the case. A new sentencing memorandum was filed that was nearly identical — but references to a riot and mob were removed. Trump and his allies have vigorously sought to rewrite the narrative of the Capitol attack.

The sentencing memo refiled by prosecutors who replaced those suspended also removed all references to the fact that Trump posted Obama’s purported address. Taranto reposted the address on the same platform and then started his livestream, according to the original sentencing memo.

Several statements in the original sentencing memo, including one that Taranto “promoted conspiracy theories about the events” of Jan. 6, were removed. CNN reported Thursday that Department of Justice and FBI officials were “reeling” from the suspensions; one source called the rewriting “Orwellian.”

Taranto is one of very few people pardoned by Trump who are still dealing with repercussions from the Capitol riot.

During Thursday’s sentencing hearing in D.C., the federal judge commended the two federal prosecutors who were placed on leave, Carlos Valdivia and Samuel White, according to NBC News. U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols, who was appointed by Trump, said Valdivia and White “did a truly excellent job.”

Prosecutors with the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington, D.C., requested that Taranto be sentenced to 27 months in prison, followed by 36 months of supervision and 200 hours of community service, according to the sentencing memo prosecutors filed Tuesday in federal court. That’s the same sentence the suspended prosecutors requested. The sentence would be enough to deter future crimes by Taranto, who showed a “lack of remorse” for his behavior in June 2023, prosecutors wrote.

Carmen Hernandez, one of Taranto’s attorneys, requested that he be sentenced to time he already served in a Washington, D.C., prison, saying his nearly 23 months of pretrial detention were more than enough to be considered fair, according to a sentencing memo Hernandez filed Wednesday. Taranto, Hernandez wrote, did not hurt anyone or damage property in the June 2023 incident, and the statements he made were supposed to be “of a humorous nature.

Taranto was released from prison in May.