A New York man jailed for nearly four years on January 6 has had his trial postponed again as he hopes to be dismissed or pardoned once President-elect Donald Trump takes office in January.
Sullivan County native Jake Lang, who is charged with serious crimes for allegedly assaulting police officers outside the U.S. Capitol in 2021, was ultimately set to stand trial on Dec. 2 after a series of postponements he had requested since 2022. Arrested in Newburgh 10 days after the murder. The riot has left Lang in custody longer than any other Jan. 6 suspect with pending charges.
But now his last trial date in Washington, DC, has also been removed from the calendar.
The federal judge hearing the case postponed it again Tuesday at the request of Lang’s attorney, who argued that Trump’s election on Nov. 5 marked a seismic shift in federal policy toward the Jan. 6 suspects. Since Trump won, there has been a flurry of similar requests to delay trials or sentencing from Jan. 6 based on his vow to consider pardons for his supporters who stormed the Capitol.
Lang’s lawyer had asked that his trial be moved to after Trump’s inauguration on January 20 – “to allow the new administration to deal with these matters.” The proceedings against Lang could soon be moot after that review, attorney Steven Metcalf argued, citing “the high likelihood of a presidential pardon or dismissal of charges.”
“It is neither just nor efficient to subject the defendant to a show trial before a biased jury, under a prosecution marred by political bias,” Metcalf wrote.
The FBI has identified Edward Lang as the man with the shield and baseball bat in this Jan. 6 photo of a pro-Trump crowd clashing with police and security forces as people try to storm the U.S. Capitol.
Prosecutors argue that expectations of a Jan. 6 pardon are speculative
Prosecutors opposed the motion in a court filing Tuesday, citing nine other Jan. 6 cases in which judges had denied similar requests for delays since Trump’s victory. They argued that a pardon was too uncertain to stop a trial “involving serious crimes, including multiple attacks on police officers.”
“Lang’s claim that he is a candidate for a presidential pardon is purely speculative and does not warrant a delay in his trial,” wrote Karen Rochlin, one of the assistant U.S. attorneys who prosecuted the case.
Delay sought: A New York man jailed since 2021 on Capitol riot charges seeks another delay in trial for assaulting officers
Before ruling on the request at a pre-trial conference Tuesday, Judge Carl Nichols reportedly weighed the potential impact of a new administration on Lang’s case and asked prosecutors whether a trial after Jan. 20 was worth the time and expense would be, according to a report from WUSA, a Washington, D.C., TV station that was in the courtroom.
Nichols ultimately granted a two-month extension, allowing the trial to begin in February. In a second report of Tuesday’s hearing, the Washington Post reported that Nichols indicated he had “recognized that the time and expense of a jury trial could become unnecessary if the case were dismissed.”
Couy Griffin, founder of ‘Cowboys for Trump’, who spent two weeks in prison for his role in the January 6 riot at the United States Capitol, sits on his horse in front of the Metropolitan Detention Center on May 8, 2024 Brooklyn. Griffin was in the jail along with Ned Lang, father of Jan. 6 defendant Jake Lang, who is incarcerated. They were at the prison to protest what they believe is Jake Lang’s incarceration in solitary confinement.
Nichols, a Trump-appointed judge who was confirmed by the Senate as a district court judge in 2019, denounced in court the idea of a blanket pardon “or something like that” for January 6 suspects, saying it would be “beyond frustrating and disappointing . ”, both news media reported.
Jake Lang: ‘There’s a tornado…his name is Donald Trump’
Still, Lang, who was there for the conference, made a jubilant prediction about Trump’s return, as he later recounted in a social media post that matched WUSA’s description. It came as a response after Rochlin told the judge that predicting a pardon on Jan. 6 was akin to describing a tornado or hurricane that occurred outside the windowless courtroom.
Prison interview: Three years after the January 6 riots, a New York man accused of beating officers is still awaiting trial in jail
“There is a tornado and a hurricane outside this building right now and his name is Donald Trump,” Lang said in WUSA’s report. “And he’s crossing the Justice Department.”
Long sounded confident that he and other January 6 defendants will be acquitted in his post on devoted to the most valuable things. Glorious cause: American freedom.”
Chris McKenna covers government and politics for The Journal News and USA Today Network. Reach him at cmckenna@gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on Rockland/Westchester Journal News: Capitol riot: New York man hopes for Trump’s pardon over trial delay
