Jury convicts Jan. 6 defendant who blamed Trump for Capitol ...

Link CopiedA jury on Thursday convicted the Jan. 6 defendant Dustin Thompson on all six charges he faced — including felony obstruction of Congress — rejecting his effort to blame Donald Trump’s campaign of disinformation about the election results for his conduct.The verdict, the third conviction in three jury trials for the Justice Department, was a significant validation of prosecutors’ effort to separate the actions of individual participants in the Jan. 6, 2021, riot from the attempts by Trump to subvert the election results.After the verdict, U.S. District Court Judge Reggie Walton tore into Trump for his efforts to dupe supporters into believing the election was stolen.“I think our democracy is in trouble because, unfortunately, we have charlatans like our former president who doesn’t, in my view, really care about democracy but only about power,” Walton said.But he reserved his harshest comments for Thompson, whom he described as “weak-minded” and part of a “gullible” throng of Trump backers who couldn’t separate his claims from reality. He stood by as rioters assaulted police in a Capitol tunnel and ran away from officers that evening when they approached him to ask about the coat rack.But Shamansky urged the jury to consider the “mental” impact that Trump’s words had over time.“He consumed these lies and this misinformation,” Shamansky said, calling Trump an “evil and sinister man who would stop at nothing to get his way on Jan. 6.” Shamansky described Thompson as a “pawn” in Trump’s “sick game” to remain in power.“In your hearts, in your heads,” Shamansky said to the jury, “do the right thing.”The arguments capped a trial in which there was unusually broad agreement between prosecutors and the defense attorneys about the defendant’s conduct.