On Friday, DOJ arrested the DC police lieutenant, Shane Lamond, whom Enrique Tarrio repeatedly used during trial in an attempt to claim he had cooperated with police and therefore hadn’t planned a seditious attack on the Capitol.
The indictment charges Lamond with one count of obstructing the investigation into the Proud Boys’ burning of the Black Lives Matter flag in December 2020, and three counts of lying in an June 2, 2021 interview when he claimed:
- Lamond’s relationship consisted of just receiving tips from Tarrio instead of him providing confidential information to him
- He never tipped Tarrio off to details of the BLM investigation
- He didn’t provide Tarrio advance notice of the warrant for his arrest obtained on December 30, 2020
The case is largely built off Telegram communications obtained from Tarrio’s seized phone (which, remember, took a year to exploit, in part because Tarrio had good security for it).
One of the eye-popping details in the indictment is that of 147 Telegram texts Lamond and Tarrio exchanged between December 18 (when Tarrio took the blame for burning the BLM flag — though he’s not actually the one who burned it) and January 4, when he was arrested, 101 of their Telegram messages were auto-destructed.
Between December 18, 2020, and through at least January 4, 2021, LAMOND and Tarrio used Telegram to exchange approximately 145 messages using the secret chat function, utilizing end-to-end encryption and self-destruct timers. At least 101 of these messages were destroyed.
DOJ established what these texts said in significant part based on what Tarrio then told others about his communications with Lamond.
The case is largely built off the Telegram messages that would have been found on Tarrio’s phone when it was seized in January 4.
But not entirely.
Paragraphs 53 to 64 rely on Telegram texts sent after Tarrio’s arrest — and so must come from some other phone (possibly the one he borrowed after his arrest). They substantially pertain to January 6. I believe the March 16 grand jury that returned the indictment is the one that has been focused on January 6 cases.
That section includes language establishing that the investigation into the Proud Boys continues and Lamond knew of the investigation into the Proud Boys by January 7.
56. By January 7, 2021, LAMOND was aware of the Federal Investigation.
57. As part of the Federal Investigation, beginning on January 6, 2021, and continuing to the present, the FBI and USAO investigated and continue to investigate Tarrio’s, the Proud Boys”, and their associates’ participation in and planning for the January 6 Attack.
This is the kind of language that DOJ would use to lay out obstruction of a second investigation, the January 6 one. Given that the investigation is ongoing, it could put Lamond on the hook for ongoing obstruction of the investigation.
Yet they didn’t charge him for that, even though they describe that he told a lie about tipping off Tarrio to details about the January 6 investigation, in addition to tipping him off about the BLM investigation.
71. During the interview, LAMOND misleadingly stated that he had “one or two” conversations with Tarrio on January 6, 2021, or the day after, and that Tarrio had told LAMOND that Tarrio believed he could have stopped the January 6 Attack.
72. LAMOND did not disclose that Tarrio had identified to LAMOND an associate who was present at the U.S. Capitol on January 6 or that Tarrio had previously made comments about attending events in Washington, D.C. on January 6.
With no additional work, DOJ could charge Lamond with this lie too, and with it, obstructing a second investigation.
In other words, this looks like an opening gambit, one that invites Lamond to start cooperating in the January 6 investigation or risk being added to a conspiracy with a guy who just got convicted of sedition.
I’ve argued for years that a number of other investigative steps in the January 6 investigation were awaiting the Proud Boys trial and verdict.
Lamond’s prosecution is one of those things. And this indictment was structured to be an investigative indictment.
Update: Here’s a list of all the people IDed in this indictment.
Person 1: Someone whom Tarrio told on December 30, 2020, that, per his “contact,” the DA of DC had not yet signed his arrest warrant.
Person 2: Someone on MOSD who asked if Tarrio’s arrest would happen on January 6. (This should be available in the threads released at trial).
Person 3: An official with the Capitol Police Department whom Lamond likened hate crimes with political crimes.
Person 4: Another personal contact of Tarrio’s, he explained on January 1 that “he says that he doesn’t think they’re going to sign off on it.”
Person 5: Possibly a girlfriend of Tarrio’s. After he tells the person, “warrant was just signed,” she says, “Babe :/”
Person 6: Almost certainly Alex Jones, Lamond describes that it’s “fucking bad when Person 6 was the voice of reason and they wouldn’t listen to him.” Lamond parrots Jones’ cover story.
Person 7: After MD cops visited her house on January 6, Tarrio asked Lamond if she was on the suspect list.