(ASSOCIATED PRESS) The U.S. Supreme Court pressed the Justice Department Tuesday on the breadth of a post-Enron obstruction statute used in hundreds of Jan. 6 cases, with justices repeatedly posing questions about whether, and how, it could be used against future protestors.
The justices’ decision, which is expected in June, could have major ramifications for more than 300 defendants charged with obstructing the certification of the 2020 election. Former President Donald Trump, who was indicted last year on four felony counts related to his own efforts to overturn the results of the election, faces the same charge.
The challenge was brought by Joseph W. Fischer, a former Pennsylvania police officer facing multiple felony counts for allegedly charging a line of police inside the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6. One of those counts, 18 U.S.C. § 1512(c)(2) - obstruction of an official proceeding - was dismissed in 2022 by U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols. Judge Nichols, a former deputy assistant attorney general who was nominated to the federal bench by Trump in 2019, found that the law required Fischer and other defendants to “have taken some action with respect to a document, record, or other object in order to corruptly obstruct, impede or influence an official proceeding.”
The DOJ appealed Nichols’ decision, and last April, a three-judge panel of the D.C. Circuit agreed and reversed Nichols, setting up Fischer’s appeal to the Supreme Court.
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