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Insurrectionist Somerville yoga instructor sentenced to a year in prison; he appeals
By adamg on Thu, 08/03/2023 - 12:12am
Bacon, in Space Force hat, inside the Capitol, via government sentencing memorandum.
A federal judge in Washington, DC last week sentenced Noah Bacon, 30, to one year and one day in federal prison following his conviction for traipsing around the Capitol as part of Donald Trump's failed autogolpe.
A jury in March convicted Bacon on a felony charge of obstruction of an official proceeding and on misdemeanor charges of entering or remaining in a restricted building or grounds, disorderly or disruptive conduct in a restricted building, entering and remaining in the gallery of either House of Congress, disorderly or disruptive conduct in a Capitol building, and parading, demonstrating, or picketing in a Capitol building.
Bacon this week signaled his intent to appeal his conviction in the DC federal appeals court.
In a sentencing memorandum, prosecutors had asked for a sentence of 37 months, citing "the gravity of Bacon’s conduct, his lack of remorse, and his patently false testimony at trial."
In their filing, prosecutors said that in the weeks following Trump's loss in November, Bacon wrote one correspondent he was "glued to the computer" reading everything he could of the rantings of Sidney Powell, a Trump lawyer who filed repeatedly failing "kraken" lawsuits in an attempt to overturn the results in certain key states, whom Bacon called "so awesome, a hero!"
Prosecutors say he decided to travel to Washington for Jan. 6 after "a frustrated attempt to organize a meditation retreat" - and entered the Senate chambers at 2:15 p.m., not long after the initial breach of the Capitol, then joined the mob chanting "Nancy, Nancy, Nancy" as it made its way up to the second floor and around the Capitol.
Bacon's lawyer, however, urged a sentence with some home confinement and probation.
Despite having the ability, he has yet to obtain a college degree or found meaningful employment. He is employed doing odd jobs while he attends on-line college classes. Mr. Bacon has spent the greater part of his adult life practicing and teaching yoga and in spiritual meditation. (Mr. Bacon spent some minutes inside the Capitol meditating). In letters to the court Mr. Bacon has been called "a lost soul" and "naïve." ... Collectively the letters to the court [on his behalf] portray a person seeking to find his place in life but a person who is peaceful, generous with his time, devoted to yoga and meditation and not deserving of incarceration for his out-of-character actions on January 6, 2021.
He added:
He was not armed, and he committed no violent actions. Mr. Bacon did not destroy anything.
Message Bacon sent a friend on Jan. 7, via the US Attorney's office:
Government sentencing memorandum (9.2M PDF).
Defense sentencing memorandum (231k PDF).
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Comments
Insurrection?
When was the insurrection? Why wasn’t this reported?
It was in all the papers, but, tsk, it failed
Maybe I should have written "failed insurrectionist."
Or how about "failed putschist?" "Or "failed y'all Quedaist?" Or "failed rabble member?" There's plenty more where that came from, but you get the idea.
"Autogolpe" is the perfect
"Autogolpe" is the perfect word here, but if anon troll didn't recognize that, you were damned clear without it.
He knew what you were talking about. The insurrectionists and their supporters know damned well that they marched into the Capitol carrying the flags of a previous armed insurrection, in an attempt to overthrow the government of the United States.
Part of why we have so much evidence against them is that they assumed they'd win (so it was OK to put things in writing and on computers they didn't own), and then assumed that there would be no consequences for failure.
As some have pointed out,
As some have pointed out, many of these people had plane tickets back that night or the next day. They really thought they were going to overthrow the government on Tuesday, take a day off Wednesday, and back to work on Thursday.
Ask your friends about what
Ask your friends about what they definitely weren't doing in Washington DC on January 6, 2021.
Thanks Adam
Somehow in my 71 years on this planet I never encountered the term “autogolpe”, although I am familiar with the Spanish word golpe. I still learn something every day
It's an interesting term
Which fortunately we don't have much reason to need here in the US, given our tradition of peaceful handovers of power, at least up through Jan. 6, 2021.
"self-coup"
"self-coup" may be a more familiar term to US readers, but probably not that much more.
There is nothing familiar
There is nothing familiar about self-coup. Sounds like something a shy chicken would do. /s
Good for him he didn't do
Good for him he didn't do anything serious, just tried to overthrow the government. Not like he was found guilty of owning a little bit of crack while having dark skin.
What a swerve..
Prosecutors say he decided to travel to Washington for Jan. 6 after "a frustrated attempt to organize a meditation retreat"
..dude needs to work on his coping skills.
Judging by the defense
Judging by the defense counsel's description of his life, he doesn't have a lot of skills of any kind. Which leads me to another question: if he's unemployed (sorry, doing "odd jobs"), what or who is he living off of?
Looks like he's going to be doing a lot of downward dog...
Yes, that comment is completely in bad taste.
He may get good conduct points for teaching
Perhaps he has now learned that the central philosophy of eastern mysticism is not sedition.
Worse than bad
Rape jokes are vile and reflect poorly on the one who tells them, regardless of their target.
Thanks for the tip
...