In a brand new improvement within the ongoing battle for transparency surrounding the Authorities’s unprecedented lawfare towards January 6 defendants, J6er Ryan Zink and his lawyer, Roger Roots, have filed an opposition (Doc 155, filed April 21, 2025) to the federal government’s try to hide crucial proof from the general public.
This submitting, submitted within the U.S. District Court docket for the District of Columbia, follows Zink’s recent victory in lifting a protective order on January 6 discovery supplies and the government’s subsequent push to reverse that decision. The most recent submitting reveals a beforehand unreleased doc, marked “extremely delicate” by the federal government, which lists the accidents reported by Metropolitan Police Division (MPD) officers on January 6.
The doc shatters the federal government’s narrative of a violent “rebel,” exposing it as a deliberate lie designed to smear President Donald Trump and intervene within the 2024 election.
The “extremely delicate” doc, included as a part of Zink and Roots’ submitting, particulars that solely 56 MPD officers reported accidents associated to the January 6 protest.
Removed from the catastrophic “assault” on regulation enforcement peddled by the Division of Justice (DOJ), the accidents listed are sometimes trivial, with many described merely as “ache” in varied components of the physique. Examples embrace a “laceration to the pinky finger,” and nebulous, nondescriptive studies of “again ache” and “head ache.”
Solely 18 officers had been handled at a hospital, with only one—Officer Michael Fanone—remaining admitted for what the federal government has exaggerated as “critical accidents.” Notably, the submitting highlights that Fanone’s personal bodycam footage contradicts his claims of struggling a coronary heart assault or traumatic mind harm, exhibiting him stating he was “O.Okay.” and fascinating in lighthearted conversations with colleagues.
Much more putting, the submitting reveals that whereas solely 56 officers reported accidents, roughly 180 MPD members reported utilizing drive towards protesters.
Which means that for each officer claiming an harm, three officers reported that they used drive on January 6 protesters. In the meantime, almost 1,600 January 6 defendants have been arrested, prosecuted, and, in lots of instances, imprisoned, with plans to focus on one other 1,000 had President Trump not intervened. This doc definitively reveals that the overwhelming majority of J6ers had been peaceable protestors who didn’t assault officers.
The federal government systematically exaggerated police “accidents” from January 6 to be able to perpetuate its “violent rebel” narrative. Most accidents had been within the nature of ache, a handful of bruises, some sprained ankles, or delicate cuts. Metro PD’s checklist of 56 injured officers contained only one damaged bone (a compound fracture of a finger).
The doc’s designation as “extremely delicate” raises critical questions concerning the authorities’s motives. Who determined to categorise this checklist of minor accidents as prime secret? What standards had been used to justify hiding it from the general public? And, most critically, what else is buried within the over 8 million recordsdata that comprise the January 6 discovery?
The federal government’s push to maintain these supplies underneath wraps is led by Assistant U.S. Legal professional Jennifer Blackwell, who’s now urging Decide James E. Boasberg to reverse his order lifting the protecting order. Zink and Roots argue that Blackwell’s efforts are a part of a broader marketing campaign to protect the DOJ’s misconduct from public scrutiny. The submitting accuses the federal government of exaggerating claims about “nationwide safety” and “privateness rights” to justify concealing proof that debunks its narrative.
For instance, the federal government has claimed that the invention incorporates delicate details about “a whole bunch of witnesses and victims,” but Roots counters that the supplies include “virtually no privileged or confidential data, and completely no particulars or figuring out details about informants.”
The submitting additionally highlights particular cases of presidency deception. Along with Fanone’s exaggerated claims, it factors to Officer Daniel Hodges, who falsely acknowledged he by no means swung his baton at protesters, regardless of bodycam footage exhibiting him violently partaking nonviolent demonstrators.
The federal government’s false claims concerning Metro Officer Daniel Hodges are additionally belied by Officer Hodges’ personal bodycam footage. Officer Hodges claimed on the sentencing of Patrick Montgomery, for instance, that Hodges by no means swung his baton at anybody on January 6. Nevertheless, Hodges’ personal bodycam footage reveals Hodges and different cops violently wading right into a crowd of nonviolent protestors whereas punching, pushing, and swinging a police baton offensively. This footage reveals J6 defendant Patrick Montgomery (and different courageous J6ers) making an attempt to cease the crazed, out-of-control Hodges, by grabbing Hodges’ baton.
Equally, the federal government smeared Trump supporter Rosanne Boyland, claiming she died of a drug overdose, when bodycam footage reveals she died amid violent abuse and neglect by MPD officers. These examples, Roots argues, underscore the general public’s proper to entry the January 6 discovery to show the DOJ’s sample of lies.
The general public has clearly been misled and confused by the federal government’s claims. And the general public has a proper to view the precise proof from January 6 in order that the report of historical past of January 6 could also be clarified.
Zink and Roots’ submitting challenges the very basis of the protecting order, noting that the circumstances justifying it 4 years in the past not exist. The federal government itself has launched detailed video simulations of the Capitol and a whole bunch of hours of footage throughout January 6 trials, rendering claims of “nationwide safety” absurd. With tens of millions of holiday makers touring the Capitol yearly and its format broadly identified, the concept that surveillance digital camera areas or different discovery supplies pose a safety risk is, in Roots’ phrases, “preposterous.”
The general public’s demand for reality is obvious.
A 2024 Newsweek poll cited within the submitting discovered that 52% of People consider the total reality about January 6 has not been shared, in comparison with simply 29% who suppose it has. By combating to maintain the invention hidden, Blackwell and the DOJ are obstructing the general public’s First Modification proper to scrutinize the federal government’s actions in what has turn into some of the controversial prosecutions in U.S. historical past.
Zink and Roots’ newest submitting is a name for accountability and calls for solutions: Why is the federal government so determined to cover a doc itemizing minor accidents like a minimize pinky finger? What different revelations lie throughout the January 6 discovery that the DOJ fears the general public will see?
As Roots concludes, “The federal government’s premature movement ought to be denied, and the reality about January 6 should be totally uncovered.” This combat for transparency isn’t just about Zink’s case—it’s about restoring belief in a justice system that has been weaponized towards Americans.
