SCOTUS swats away demand from Jan. 6 rioter to reverse conviction over 'demonstrating' inside Capitol

Source: Law & Crime

Nov 12th, 2024, 6:28 pm


The U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal by a Jan. 6 defendant who challenged a charge for “parading, picketing or demonstrating in a Capitol building,” making the lower court’s decision the final ruling on the matter. The case centers around John Maron Nassif, 57, of Florida, who was arrested in 2021 and then convicted in 2022 on charges that he entered and remained on restricted grounds at the Capitol. While there, he led a chant to a crowd yelling, “Whose House?” and then shouted back, “Our House!”

He was also convicted of other misdemeanors, including disorderly and disruptive conduct in a restricted building, violent entry in a Capitol building and parading and demonstrating or picketing in a Capitol building. He was sentenced to seven months in prison, served his time and was released in January. He appealed his conviction and argued at length that the charge of parading and picketing was overbroad and unconstitutional.

The judge who convicted Nassif at a bench trial, U.S. District Judge John Bates, an appointee of former President George W. Bush, rejected Nassif’s attempt to dismiss the parading charge pretrial. He found that historically, courts had ruled that the interior of the Capitol is a “nonpublic forum” where the federal government “may limit First Amendment activities so long as the restrictions are ‘reasonable in light of the purpose of the forum and are viewpoint neutral,” Bates’ opinion explained.

Bates noted that the Supreme Court previously identified only three types of public property for First Amendment analysis: the traditional public forum, like streets or parks; a designated public forum; and the nonpublic forum. With his motion, Bates wrote that Nassif would have the court only focus on the words “parade, demonstrate and picket” in the statute instead of the six operative words that follow it: “in any of the Capitol buildings.”

Read more: https://lawandcrime.com/high-profile/whose-house-our-house-scotus-swats-away-demand-from-jan-6-rioter-to-reverse-conviction-over-demonstrating-inside-capitol/