Judge praises suspended prosecutors before sentencing man for bomb hoax
A U.S. district court judge on Thursday praised two suspended federal prosecutors who had been handling the case of a man once accused of participating in the Jan. 6, 2021, U.S. Capitol attack. The defendant, Taylor Taranto, was in court to be sentenced on an unrelated weapons charge.
Assistant U.S. Attorneys Carlos Valdivia and Samuel White were suspended earlier this week after referencing the Capitol attack as a “riot” carried out by a “mob” in a sentencing recommendation against Taranto, according to people familiar with the matter.
Taranto, whose Jan. 6 charges were dismissed after President Donald Trump’s clemency orders on his first day back in office, was convicted for a “perpetrated hoax” he committed two years later. Prosecutors argued he lied on live-stream footage about having a car bomb and saying he would drive it into the National Institute of Standards and Technology, according to court records.
He also reposted an address of former President Barack Obama after Trump posted it to social media and then drove through the Kalorama neighborhood in search of “tunnels” leading to Obama and other “high-profile individuals” homes.
Assistant U.S. Attorneys Travis Wolf and Jonathan Hornok, head of the U.S. attorney’s office’s criminal division, attended the sentencing on Thursday instead of Valdivia and White.
Judge Carl J. Nichols openly commended the suspended prosecutors before handing down his sentence, describing their work as “the best” and saying they “held the highest standard of professionalism.”
“In my view,” Nichols said, “they did a truly excellent job.”
The government’s initial sentencing filing had been replaced by Wednesday afternoon with a new document that did not mention Jan. 6, or Trump’s social media post. The memo was also removed from the public docket.
Nichols noted the government’s submission of two sentencing briefs. He said it wasn’t “entirely clear” to him how the first brief was sealed and he intends to unseal it, unless the government can submit its reasoning in writing within a week.
The judge called the freshly submitted sentencing memo “extremely late breaking.”
Federal prosecutors sought a sentence at the top of the sentencing guidelines: 27 months of incarceration plus 36 months of supervised release among other conditions.
Taranto’s defense attorneys argued that the federal hoax charge brought against the Navy veteran and married father of two appeared to be retribution for him not taking a plea deal to Jan. 6-related misdemeanors.
Taranto spoke briefly in court, saying: “This case started out with Jan. 6 charges.”
Carmen Hernandez, one of Taranto’s attorneys, said in court that the government knew Taranto was found to have no explosives, yet eight months after he declined to plea in Jan. 6 misdemeanors, her client was federally charged.
“From his point of view, he believed he was expressing first amendment … dark humor,” Hernandez said, comparing it to an Orson Welles “The War of the Worlds” broadcast.
Nichols said Taranto’s actions had to be taken seriously. Taranto suggested his van was rigged with explosives, which led to a bomb squad evacuating a residential neighborhood. A search of the van also uncovered Taranto unlawfully carried firearms while in the district. However, he acknowledged that Taranto didn’t have a bomb and his behavior “was far from egregious” and that Taranto had no serious criminal history.
Nichols sentenced him to 21 months of incarceration, which for Taranto amounted to time served. He placed Taranto on 36 months of supervised release and ordered him to participate in cybercrime management.
Taranto indicated he plans to appeal.
Wolf and Hornok declined to comment after the hearing and referred comment to their office.
Asked at a news conference Thursday whether she ordered the initial sentencing memo to be taken down, U.S. Attorney for D.C. Jeanine Pirro said: “I think the papers speak for themselves and what goes on in this office is not something that I’m going to comment on.”
Jeremy Roebuck, Emily Davies and Juan Benn Jr. contributed to this report.
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