Game of Cups

It’s called a “shell game.” The pea, placed under one of three upside-down cups, shuffled about, in a sleight of hand that amounts to a short-con. Quick. Easy to pull off.

It’s the stage we’re at with all of those fighting to write the history of January 6, but who can no longer remember where the truth ended and the lie began. So, instead, they are stalling out, hoping we’ve forgotten that there was a pea involved or, that if we remembered that there was a pea, that we confuse it in another narrative involving a princess.

There came a minute last week that I knew. Knew I had my finger on the pulses of the myriad of bad actors who craved the chaos at the Capitol and did whatever it was they knew how to do to contribute to a public relations nightmare for a president. Knew I had gotten just lucky enough in my selection of research targets that the fissures were starting to break the surface. Knew my hope was to have the right stick of dynamite to drop down those cracks to split them open.

Last week, at some 220 mph, I abruptly slammed on the brakes in numerous research pathways when I rounded a final corner after a rat I was chasing down Rove Alley and found myself, surprisingly, at the steps of the Capitol. I had run smack into the House January 6 Select Committee subpoena list and saw it to contain not only a Rove copycat, but also a single Oath Keeper, one of the three currently incarcerated.

And when the adrenaline cleared my ears, I closed my eyes. And I listened. And, I heard nothing.

I sent out several e-mails to ask questions and I made a few phone calls.

And still, I heard nothing.

24-hours later: still nothing.

Then an e-mail notification popped up about the case of Lonnie Leroy Coffman, “The Molotov Man,” informing me that his case was, again, postponed by the attorneys from both sides putting the plea agreement onto the record. I had written his attorney an e-mail asking if he thought the plea would finally be put on the record, given that the lawyers claimed to the judge a deal was reached months ago, but the case has been continually adjourned. The adjournment was my answer. Now the lawyer knows that at least one litigation attorney in America has studied the proceedings of USA vs. Lonnie Leroy Coffman, and wants to know “What gives?” Coffman, after all, is the guy with a cooler full of Molotov cocktails, multiple firearms, a cross bow with bolts, and other assorted goodies, parked outside DC Metro Capitol station and the RNC at 9:15 am on January 6, 2021, a couple of walking blocks from the U.S. Capitol. The Capitol is the direction Coffman walked after parking the truck.

Adjourned to December 12.

“This is not a game of luck, but the science of memory, and a quick hand.”

There was, at the same time, also this problem of the exact location of the three “Oath Keeper” housed within the Washington, D.C. prisons. You see, on October 18, the employee at WDC prisons on the other end of the phone said “Detention Facility” – the same location spoken on November 8. Except that on November 2, the U.S. Marshal’s Office issued a “Press Release” stating that all January 6 defendants were at the “Treatment Facility” and would stay there (the “Detention Facility” being investigated by them week of October 18 and condemned). My emails to the attorneys for detainees Kenneth Harrelson, Kelly Meggs, and Jessica Watkins went unanswered. My call to the WDC office of Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene on point went unreturned.

Ultimately, in response to a phone call to the prison locator on November 11, it was said the prisoners are in the “Treatment Facility.”

“I’ve got a quick eye. I’ve been watching you,” says the man.

Then, there’s defendant Jon Schaffer, the heavy metal rocker, avowed anarchist. One of the first six into the Capitol. Deal struck April 16, which also got him released, with permission to travel “the lower 48, as needed” to continue his music career. His plea deal also contained a witness protection clause, the extracted pound of flesh apparently having been the DOJ “Press Release” headline heard round the world that an “Oath Keeper” plead guilty to “Obstruction of Congress” and “Entering/Remaining in a restricted building or grounds with a deadly or dangerous weapon.” (Note: mace.)

Schaffer hadn’t been sentenced or appeared in court in more than six months. It seemed the attorneys for both sides failed to file the court-ordered status report to Judge Mehta by June 15. The Court seemed not to notice this until September 12, when it issued a “Minute Order” for the attorneys to submit the status report by September 17. No submissions were made. No further order of the Court was made, either.

Side note: How would witness protection work for the lead singer in a band whose tour schedule included such venues as Belgrade? Can a rocker adopt a nom de plume and switch to hip hop? 53,099 fans on “songkick” are still signed up for concert alerts for “Iced Earth” and they will want to know.

Then, on November 12, a spontaneous filing was made by Schaffer’s attorneys, including this remark “Multiple defendants charged in the case in which the Defendant is cooperating have been presented before the Court; several are in the process of exploring case resolutions and a trial date has yet to be set.”

Adjourned to January 8.

“Three choices: right, left, or middle.”

Now: Jeremy Michael Brown, or “Mr. Brown,” as I call him. Ah, now there’s another quite interesting affair. Mr. Brown is the guy who sat down with FBI agents who rang his doorbell ahead of January 6, and who did two-hour interview in which he said there’s no way he will ever take a deal. Mr. Brown said he wants to go to trial so he can blow the lid off the whole thing. (Observation: this may be why the FBI was calling this Green Beret on January 6 as he approached the Capitol.)

Arrested September 29, but unknown to the employees on the other end of the WDC prison locator number. (Silly me for having thought he, too, would be transferred to WDC. Apparently, the fact that the DOJ motioned to transfer the case to Judge Mehta doesn’t mean that the incarcerated Mr. Brown will join Harrelson, Meggs, and Watkins in the WDC prison, pending trial.)

Since the October 12 date Judge Mehta ruled to accept transfer of the case to his courtroom, there has been no further activity on the case.

No scheduled court date. Incarceration location unknown.

“I think I’ll take a fourth choice,” he says.

“Fourth?” Russell Crowe responds.

“There is no pea!” proclaims the unwitting man, who thinks he has gamed the gamer. “I’ve been watching you for a while now. There is no pea! This game is a trick! I got you.”

You see because it’s interesting that the DOJ, however, unlike in the case of Mr. Brown, did not request to transfer the case of James Breheny to Judge Mehta. That case of an alleged “Oath Keeper” is instead bouncing between Magistrate Harvey and Magistrate Faruqui, most recent volley on October 20 to punt the case to December 2. Breheny was arrested May 20, but neither has DOJ/FBI added him to the multiple, superseding indictments of the other “Oath Keeper” defendants, issued as recently as August 4, 2021.

Breheny was supposedly in direct contact with Oath Keepers founder Stuart Rhodes on January 4 in a role as “the Mid-Atlantic coordinator” of multiple groups, including in a gathering at Quarrytown, Pennsylvania – a meeting so clandestine that the FBI hadn’t even informed local LEO it was taking or had taken place.

Case calendared for December 2.

“You lose,” says Crowe, comfortably, as the gamed man lifts the third cup, revealing the pea.

On a different path, but, again, relating to the day is Ali Akbar (a/k/a “Ali Alexander”). He’s one of the holders of a permit for a rally to be held on January 6 on U.S. Capitol grounds, issued by the U.S. Capitol Police. He was subpoenaed by the House Select Committee on January 6. His testimony and record production date of October 28 came and went. Then, it was commented as rescheduled. I called the House Select Committee office for the adjourn date, but received no response.

In a different subpoena issued by the House Select Committee, dated August 25, this one to the National Archives, a request for communication with the White House relating to the January 6 rallies, including with Ali Akbar (a permit holder), plus every speaker on the list for the rallies on Tuesday, January 5 and Wednesday, January 6, plus various planners listed on permit applications, and…including Kenneth Harrelson. Harrelson is the only “Oath Keeper” defendant listed and he remains incarcerated.

Enrique Tarrio (leader of “Proud Boys”) and Robert Patrick Lewis (leader of “1APraetorian”) – also on the list. But that should have put Oath Keepers founder on the list – not Harrelson.

Status of Akbar before the Select Committee: unknown. Added value note post script: Bannon indicted by a federal grand jury on November 12 for two charges of Contempt of Congress.

In the movie “Robin Hood,” the shell game ends when Crowe lifts the third cup to reveal that there was, in fact, a pea involved. The gamer becomes enraged at being laughed at and quickly reaches out his hand to steal all the coins, but it is Crowe, having ethically conducted the shell game, who says, “You lose,” and who throws the first punch.

It’s not always clear who’s the good guy in a given situation.

Keep your eye on the pea.