Police declined to charge an ex-Senate staffer after he filmed himself having sex in a Senate hearing room, but law enforcement continues to crackdown across the nation on people who were merely present at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
On Thursday, U.S. Capitol Police announced the agency would not charge anyone involved with the production of a gay sex tape filmed in the Senate hearing room. Footage leaked from a WhatsApp chat to the Daily Caller in December showing 24-year-old Aidan Maese-Czeropski, who then worked for Democrat Maryland Sen. Ben Cardin, desecrating the upper chamber.
“After consulting with federal and local prosecutors, as well as doing a comprehensive investigation and review of possible charges,” police said, “it was determined that — despite a likely violation of Congressional policy — there is currently no evidence that a crime was committed.”
Police continued, “Although the hearing room was not open to the public at the time, the Congressional staffer involved had access to the room,” the statement said. “The two people of interest were not cooperative, nor were the elements of any of the possible crimes met. The Congressional staffer, who has since resigned from his job, exercised his Fifth Amendment right to remain silent and refused to talk to us.”
“This has been a difficult time for me,” Maese-Czeropski wrote in a December LinkedIn post, “as I have been attacked for who I love to pursue a political agenda.”
Corporate outlets eager to sensationalize the Jan. 6 Capitol riot more than three years later were quick to downplay the incident despite Czeropski’s tacit admission of guilt.
CNN’s headline — “Senate aide out of job after purported sex tape apparently filmed in Senate hearing room” — sought to remove all agency from the aide and made him appear like the victim. NBC News signaled to readers what to think about the scandal by noting it was “alleged by conservative media.” Just about every headline from legacy media omitted that Maese-Czeropski was a Democrat staffer, let alone someone who appeared in a campaign ad for President Joe Biden.
While the Capitol Police let Maese-Czeropski off the hook, federal law enforcement remains fixated on a nationwide manhunt to jail political opponents ostensibly involved in the 2021 riot. In January, the Department of Justice (DOJ) celebrated agency prosecutions with more than 1,200 defendants charged with riot-related crimes across all 50 states.
Defendants, meanwhile, are struggling to obtain a fair trial in the nation’s capital, with some charged with crimes after they were welcomed into the complex by police. Tim Hale is one individual who says he was let into the Capitol building before a 16-month incarceration featuring a year of solitary confinement for 23 hours a day. Hale was ultimately convicted of four misdemeanors and a felony under the 1512(c)(2) statute for “obstruction of an official proceeding.” The latter charge is now under scrutiny by the Supreme Court, which may expunge his felony record. More than 300 other charges filed under the same statute could be vacated pending a Supreme Court ruling.
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