Merrick Garland Explains that the January 6 Investigation Isn’t Taking All that Long

A lot of people here and elsewhere complain about how long it is taking to bring January 6 perpetrators to justice. In response to a question from Pramila Jayapal this week, Merrick Garland explained that, in his view, it actually isn’t taking so long. He adds some details (in this clip and elsewhere in the exchange with Jayapal) about the investigation, including how DOJ is attempting to standardize plea deals.

On the question you asked, which is why this is taking so long? This is really not long at all. I’ve been in lots of criminal investigations that took way longer. We’ve arrested 650 people already, and keep in mind that most of them were not investig–arrested on the spot, because the Capitol Police were overwhelmed. So they were people who had to be found, they had to be found by sometimes looking at our own video data, sometimes from citizen sleuths around the country identifying people, then they have to be brought back to Washington DC,  then discovery of terabytes of information has to be provided, and then all this was occurring while there was a pandemic and some of the grand juries were not fully operating, and some of the courtrooms were not fully operating. So I’m extremely proud of the work that prosecutors are doing in this case, and the agents are doing in this case. They’re working 24/7 on this.

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12 replies
      • Peterr says:

        “OK, but apart from the size of the insurrection, the problems of identifying perpetrators, the distance to DC, the volume of discovery, and the pandemic, what have the Romans ever done for us is taking so long?”

        /Reg, People’s Front of Judea

    • Leoghann says:

      It’s now Monday night, and I’ve read about six more since Friday. Seems like they’re being arrested in pairs.

  1. flerzo says:

    My question is if they will reach the people behind this. But then, at this point not seeing much indication of this does not mean much. They would likely have to establish the conspiracy from the ground up without showing their hand, and a couple trumpy judges may be able to destroy any carefully constructed structure by pulling away a few pillars.

    • Rugger9 says:

      That kind of case takes time to build since going after the top level usually requires someone below to flip and keep on point during the trial. That leverage has to be developed.

      • Mojo Risin' says:

        The answer is “no”, the Koches and Mercers won’t pay any price whatsoever for being the string-pullers behind the string-pullers. They’ll probably get the House back next year.

        • bmaz says:

          You are so full of it your eyes are brown. What “price” are they supposed to “pay”? Are you familiar with the Supreme Court decisions in Citizens United and, far more importantly, Buckley v. Valeo? Silly and mindless ranting like this is not helpful to the conversation here.

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