75 days
That how many days “rioter” Adam Johnson will spend in prison for his role in the violent insurrectionist assault on the U.S. Capitol Building on January 6, 2021.
Johnson was charged with, and recently pled guilty to, the misdemeanor offense for “entering or remaining on or in a restricted building or grounds” in violation of 18 U.S.C. §1752(b)(2)—an offense punishable by a fine or imprisonment up to one year, or both.
Johnson was part of a violent mob of at least a thousand people who forcefully invaded the grounds of the Capitol Building and personally joined in with hundreds of other members of the mob that violently entered the Capitol Building where they inflicted millions of dollars in property damage to the building, stole property (Johnson stole a government podium assigned to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi), and threatened to kill the Vice President of the United States and the House Speaker.
In the wake of the insurrectionist assault on the Capitol Building, five people lay dead, hundreds more were injured, and scores were left traumatized—four of whom committed suicide.
That kind of violent criminal activity has now been defined by the U.S. Justice Department as “entering” a “restricted building.” The Republican National Committee pretty much agrees with DOJ, calling the violent criminal activity “legitimate political discourse.”
There are hundreds of people on American death rows whose crimes did not cause the amount of human and property damages wreaked by Adam Johnson and his cohorts; and thousands of people serving life without parole or virtual life sentences (50 or more years) for non-violent criminal convictions—the majority of whom are people of color.
I would like to hear our mealy-mouth Attorney General, Merrick Garland, explain to Willie Simmons, a black man who spent 38 years in an Alabama prison for stealing $9, why Adam Johnson, a white man, will serve only 75 days for participating in criminal activity that left five people dead that included an attempt to “hang” the Vice President of the United States.
The American criminal justice system is terminally ill.
This justice system gave Jerry Dwayne Williams a 25 year to life sentence in 1995 for stealing a slice of pizza in California; gave Burnice Wilson a 99-year prison term in 2002 in Texas for stealing a tractor-trailer truck; and even gave Otis Babb an 18-year prison term 2017 in Texas for stealing 13 billy goats and 1 nanny goat.
This same justice system has executed 33 people since 1976 who did not actually kill anyone—not to mention the 10 or more innocent men put to death by the same system.
Last May the Mississippi Supreme Court upheld the life sentence given to a black man named Allen Russell for possessing 44 grams of marijuana.
Allen Russell will spend the rest of his life in prison for smoking a little dope while Adam Johnson, who wanted to hang Mike Pence and murder Nancy Pelosi, will spend just 75 days for “entering” a “restricted building,” which just so happened to be U.S. Capitol Building.