Abraham Lincoln wisely said "He who represents himself has a fool for a client." This statement was proven true yet again during a completely bonkers bond hearing on Tuesday when one of the January 6th rioters decided to represent himself - and somehow managed to admit to not one, but TWO MORE FELONIES on the record.
(insert Jim Carrey pulling his hair out gif here)
WUSA9 reporter, Jordan Fischer, live-tweeted and wrote an article about the entire thing. It was BONKERS. As a bit of backstory, the judge had previously warned Fellows that "he could be opening himself up to perjury – or even obstruction of justice – charges if he testified on his own behalf, and that he would likely be going back to jail, regardless."
Welp, the judge was right. He was initially indicted on a felony charge of "obstruction of an official proceeding". In the indictment, prosecutors allege that he entered the Capitol through a broken window and that he smoked pot in Sen. Merkley's office. Initially, Fellows was granted pretrial release, but due to his inability and unwillingness to follow basic conditions, he was detained in June. Some of the violations included skipping a court-ordered mental health evaluation and calling a probation officer’s mother. He was also alleged to have harassed a former girlfriend - by giving out the phone number of THE JUDGE'S WIFE to the clerk of the court instead of his own phone number.
Today, he decided to represent himself and made that request last month. During Tuesday's hearing, he attempted to have his bond reconsidered so he can be released. During the hearing, he babbled nonsensically, complained about being detained (womp womp), talked about the Taliban, antifa, Guantanamo Bay, tinfoil wrapped phones and a bunch of other crazy things.
During the cross-examination, the prosecutor got Fellows to admit that "he had climbed into the Capitol through a broken window without police permission, that he had used the previous judge’s wife’s contact information to try to get him removed from the case and that he had missed court-ordered mental health and drug testing appointments."
The judge cut him off from another rambling monologue, saying: “You’ve admitted to incredible lapses of judgment here on the stand, not least of which was seeking to disqualify a New York state judge. You’ve admitted to obstruction of justice in that case, and you’ve admitted to what was probably obstruction in this case in trying to have me disqualified, and only Ms. Halverson’s advice stopped you from doing so. You’ve engaged in a pattern of behaviors that shows contempt for the criminal justice system, and I just have no confidence that you will follow my orders if I release you.”
He was returning to D.C. Jail.
If you want to read the play-by-play of the hearing, this is the best thread:
There are so many good tweets, I could not pick a handful. It really is an experience you need to enjoy, tweet by tweet. As I read the tweets, I kept hearing the theme song to Curb Your Enthusiasm playing in the background.
ENJOY JAIL, moron.
