Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - WHO WOULD ATTACK THE INAUGURATION?

Episode Date: January 19, 2021

Tomorrow is Inauguration Day, but after last week's violent protests, security for the event is extremely tight. Thousands of National Guard troops have been brought in as support. The FBI and other agencies are vetting those troops to make sure that an attack won't come from inside security perimeters, and many streets and celebration areas are closed to the public. Will there be a disruption by domestic terrorists?Joining Nancy Grace today: Wendy Patrick - California prosecutor, author 'Red Flags', www.wendypatrickphd.com Dr. Bethany Marshall - Psychoanalyst, Beverly Hills, New Netflix show 'Bling Empire', www.drbethanymarshall.com   Colin P. Clarke - Director of Policy and Research at The Soufan Group, Focusing on Domestic and Transnational Terrorism, International Security, and Geopolitics, Author: After the Caliphate, www.soufangroup.com  Scott Taylor - Investigative Reporter, WJLA TV ABC 7 in Washington, D.C. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. The clock is ticking down to the inauguration and right now across our country and of course in D.C. everyone is on high alert after the debacle, the attack on our U.S. Capitol by American citizens. Not a threat from overseas, by American citizens. What will unfold, God forbid, tomorrow? Take a listen to our friends at CBS. This is called an NSSE or a National Special Security Event. This is the highest security designation that any event can have here in the United States.

And security is led by the Secret Service. I've been covering these since 2001. 2001 and what makes this different is the way in which the security footprint has been expanded around the Capitol and the number of days that security perimeter is in place. And of course, as you see here, the very visible military security presence up to 25,000 National Guard will be here in Washington. And the objective of government officials is to create a deterrent to harden this target in order to give a disincentive to those who might want to commit violence on Wednesday. You were hearing our friend Catherine Herridge at CBS, the senior investigative correspondent. In preparation for tomorrow, this is what we don't want to happen.

Listen. this is what we don't want to happen listen you're lucky i don't piss on you i gotta you just like you're hitting them You know what, Jackie, stop it. I can't stand to hear it. Not a threat from abroad. Our own fellow Americans attacking our capital, the symbol of our government that we all believe in. Yes, we question it. Yes, we may not like it sometimes. But it is our government with me right now.

An all-star panel. First of all, Wendy Patrick, California prosecutor, author, red flags at wendypatrickphd.com, host of Today with Dr. Wendy, KCBQ, Dr. Bethany Marshall, psychoanalyst, Beverly Hills at drbethanymarshall.com, star of a brand new Netflix series, Bling Empire, a very special guest joining me,

Colin P. Clark, director of policy and research at the Soufan Group, focusing on domestic and transnational terrorism, international security, geopolitics, author of After the Caliphate at soufangroup.com. And Scott Taylor, national award-winning investigative reporter for WJLA-TV, ABC7 in D.C. Scott Taylor, first to you. I understand there are more National Guard, more troops in D.C. than there have been since the Civil War. What does that feel like? Well, it feels, if you're in the red zone that you're basically in a prison, Nancy. And that's what I'm calling it, the red zone. They've developed multiple boxes. You have to go through multiple security and show credentials to get closer to the U.S. Capitol,

where the riot happened, or the White House, or even on the National Mall. We're talking about 15 plus city blocks. They started just with 10 last week and I went down there. Then they expanded to another five. That's really less than seven percent of a city that has over 700,000 people. But we're talking about 75 streets that are closed, four tunnels shut down, eight bridges. Most of the bridges closed this morning. The Key Bridge is one of the only bridges you can go from Virginia into D.C. right now. They've got huge concrete barricades up and those checkpoints. And what's really startling is the large dump trucks that they have right in the middle of streets. And as you mentioned, those twenty five thousand National Guardsmen, military vehicles, assault rifles.

I mean, I was just shocked, Nancy, when in front of a Starbucks, there was a National Guardsman there with an assault rifle in her tactical gear. Now, I do want to mention, if people are worried about some inside threat, the FBI, they've been doing multilayer background checks on the soldiers. And you can see the soldiers walking around, but after they pass that layered background, they actually will get a special credential, and they'll have to flash that too to get closer to the Capitol as well. Wow. Scott Taylor in the thick of it.

Joining us from D.C. with WJLA-TV ABC. And now to our special guest, Colin P. Clark with the Soufan Group. Colin, it's wonderful to get to speak to you. I've been so impressed with all you've had to say so far regarding security in DC after living through 9-1-1 in New York the morning of the attacks on the World Trade Centers and investigating the bomb. I was still a prosecutor at the time at now Centennial Park during the Olympics in Atlanta. You know, I think I've seen it all, but I haven't seen near what there is. After that attack on our Capitol, I was just stunned.

I was left in tears about how Americans could attack our own Capitol, whether you disagree or agree with the election. Still, I was stunned. What do you believe is the single most devastating threat facing us for tomorrow? Well, there's a lot. And thanks again for having me. I think, you know, there's there's clearly a threat from domestic terrorism. That's been apparent to us in in the counterterrorism field for years. We've been, you know, attempting to kind of raise the alarm bells, as it were. We've produced numerous white papers and reports. And in my community, this is a weird. I'm just a trial lawyer. What do you mean you've produced numerous white papers? What's that?

Sorry, like a policy paper looking at what we think are the most pressing security issues for the United States of America. Now, as you know, and you referenced 9-11, for the last 20 years, we've been narrowly focused on the threat from Salafi jihadist groups like al-Qaeda, like ISIS, like their respective affiliates around the world. And for good reason. We were hit hard at 9-11, and those groups very much still present a threat to global security. However, we've done that at the cost of ignoring threats that have been percolating on our own soil. We've now seen those – a lot of people said this is the logical culmination of the last four years. But I disagree. I actually think we're at the beginning of something.

I think we're potentially entering a golden age for domestic far-right extremism. You know, just what I don't want to hear 24 hours before the inauguration of our new president. And again, Colin, I know you, but you don't know me. I'm not a Republican. I'm not a Republican. I'm not a Democrat. I'm an American. I frankly don't trust any politician. I think they're all lying.

So I cannot be accused of partisanship because I hold them all in general contempt. But I don't... I call myself an equal opportunity hater. I don't want things to go wrong at this inauguration. You know, we've heard so much about how this makes us look abroad, this attack on the Capitol. God forbid anything goes wrong tomorrow. That's not my main concern, Colin. I'm not that concerned about what some other country may think about the U.S., but my big concern is the safety of everyone at the inauguration.

So how does Biden and Harris get there? How are they going to get there? Well, I think so. We often said in my time at the Rand Corporation where I spent 10 years doing work for numerous U.S. government agencies, including the Department of Defense and the intelligence community. We're not in the business of giving bad people good ideas. So I'm a bit hesitant to talk about, you know, exact plans, right? And we've already seen in the forensics of what happened at the Capitol, individuals were mapping out and planning what they sought to do. So I think to go into specifics on that would probably be irresponsible. Just tell me this, Colin P. Clark, are there underground tunnels? Very likely. I don't know. And I'm curious, do you think Biden and Harris will go

on the regular walk to the White House in the open after the inauguration? I don't know. I'd be surprised if they did. There's a lot. You mentioned the deterrent factor and, you know, National Guard's out in force. There's a lot that you do see, and that's by design. There's also a lot that you won't see, and that's also by design. And that's important to keep in mind as well. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Guys, we are talking about the impending inauguration.

Everyone is saying a prayer and holding the breath that everything goes off as planned tomorrow. Great, great security measures have been taken. Again, I'm Nancy Grace. Thank you for being with us here at Fox Nation and Sirius XM 111. Take a listen to our friends at CBS. Based on a discussion I had earlier today with a U.S. government official, when you look at these intelligence bulletins from FBI, DHS, other government agencies over the last 10 days, there's a single conclusion, which is that the greatest threat to the inauguration doesn't come from foreign terrorist organizations, but rather from domestic violent extremists.

They use this law enforcement acronym, DVEs. And what these assessments point to is conditions that have created this environment for violence. For example, the deep political divisions in this country and questions in some people's minds about the legitimacy of the presidential election. Then there are racial overlays as well. And then the ripple effect of the COVID-19 deaths and lockdowns. And the intelligence bulletins assess that this has created the perfect environment

for individuals who in the past might have sat on the sidelines and not acted out. But it's allowed them almost like fuel onto a fire, allow them to cross that threshold to violence and act out. And I think what's most important is that these intelligence assessments see the threat from domestic violent extremists or DVEs really extending well beyond January 20th. To Dr. Bethany Marshall, psychoanalyst, joining us from Beverly Hills, star of a new Netflix series, Bling Empire. Dr. Bethany, the word that has just gone down may embolden these DVEs, domestic terrorists, essentially, to act at the inauguration. And Dr. Bethany, you and I have talked about domestic terrorists and these obscure fringe groups many times. always had envisioned them as a bunch of drunk guys running through the woods on the weekend with their guns in their hands and their shirts off, having a kegger, essentially. That's not what it is at all.

And why is she, our friend from CBS, stating that the attack on the Capitol, amongst other things, emboldened people, may emboldened people to act out in a criminal way tomorrow. Nancy, there's a copycat phenomena. I mean, emulating the behaviors of others is such an important part of our development as human beings. It's what allowed us to survive as a species. As children, we look to our parents. We emulate their behavior.

We model ourselves after them. But unfortunately, like a cancer cell, this has gone awry from a social political perspective where people who have a little grain of fear, which then turns to anxiety and intolerance for ambiguity, then it turns to hate, then it foments as homicidal intent. They build each other up, they share tips, they talk to each other online, and they emulate each other's behavior. Look at a 12-step group. Look at AA. It may seem like a silly example, but one of the things we know from a mental health perspective that helps keep people stay sober or engage in good behavior is talking to other people and emulating the behaviors of others. That's the number one healing. So basically, it's a practice we've learned since childhood, since before we can remember prosecuting felonies. I always noticed how the pack mentality would set in once one person did it, then everybody else would follow that was of that frame of mind. But what's so amazing to me, back to you, Colin P. Clark, joining us from the Souffant Group, take a listen to our cut 27

seemingly ordinary people, not these friends group nuts that you would expect to show up in full tactical gear. But, Frances, a realtor. Listen. The documents include pictures showing a woman investigators identified as Ryan from another angle. She circled in red just inside the doors holding up her phone. Moments before the YouTube video ends, she says this. Right here. I'm not going any further. I don't need to go farther. Ryan has an active Twitter account. One tweet mentioned in the documents posted just before 6 p.m. the day of the riots reads, quote, we just stormed the Capitol. It was one of the best days

of my life. You know what? It's just almost too much for me to take in to Scott Taylor, award-winning investigative reporter, WJLA TV, ABC 7 there in D.C. You have to watch out not only for these so-called homegrown terrorists that Colin P. Clark is telling us about. You got to watch out for the white bread girl with the long blonde hair trying to plug her realty business as she's storming the Capitol. Yeah, you also have to watch out for a mom and a son who show up in D.C. They're captured on video outside and inside the Senate chamber. Eric Munchell, he's the son, and Lisa Eisenhardt, the mom. Eric is in court today, this morning in D.C.

And you might remember, Nancy, he was the guy who was in the Senate chambers with zip ties, believe it or not. And let me tell you, both were arrested in Tennessee. And I don't understand a mom and her son doing something like this together. I mean, how does a mother go along and push her son, go along with her son to commit a felony? Yeah, you know, Nancy, I think that we've all sort of come to the consensus that when you are in the middle of a riot, a mob mentality seems to take over your logic, your better judgment. And when you talk about this copycat behavior, you know, Nancy, you and I have dealt for years with this, as has Dr. Bethany and some of our other guests. It's a combination sometimes of provocation and predisposition.

It's a toxic combination. But what you see here when you have parents taking their kids to a riot that's spilled into the Capitol has got to be more than that, because you can't simply argue that anybody here was predisposed necessarily, except that, like you said, you're taking this lesson from the rest of the mob, which is the worst circumstances under which you can make a decision that has been life-changing, unfortunately, for so many of those protesters. Magic Holland P. Clark, Director of Policy and Research at the Soufan Group, focusing on domestic and transnational terrorism. Take a listen to our cut number 14. And this is our friend Jeff Begaz at CBS News.

Listen. In all the chaos that day, someone stole a laptop from the House Speaker's office. Investigators say they are looking for Riley June Williams, who is now a fugitive. Court papers show how investigators tracked the Pennsylvania woman's movements all the way into Pelosi's office. They also say that they got a tip that she intended to send the computer device to a friend in Russia, who then planned to sell it to Russia's foreign intelligence service, but that fell through. To Colin P. Clark from the Sufan Group.

Colin, here you've got this girl. By the way, she was just arrested running from her mommy's house, willing to sell or give Nancy Pelosi's laptop to the Russians. How do you prepare for somebody like her calling tomorrow? Well, there's a couple of things to mention here. One, we've long known that the Russians have been a major counterintelligence threat. So this, you know, actually runs in parallel with a lot of the analysis that we've been producing. The second part is it gives you some sense into what these people consider to be patriots. That's all I heard was, I'm a patriot. Let's go, patriots.

They're actually attacking the U.S. government and the Capitol and threatening to hang the vice president. So in what world are these people patriots? Nancy, you mentioned education before. You were talking about school. I think what we've seen is a clear failing of the U.S. education system. These people don't know basic history. They have no idea what happened. They talk about the Second Amendment,

but they have no idea what the Fifth and Seventh is. These aren't constitutional scholars. And I don't blame them for that. I don't fault them for that. But they're learning history through memes, and that's really dangerous. And we're seeing the result of that when they use this type of rhetoric.

Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Guys, countdown to the inauguration. And whether you love him or hate him, Biden is our president now. So get in line. Fall in line. That's the deal. The behavior at the U.S. Capitol will not be tolerated with me and All-Star panel to figure out how we're going to protect the inauguration. Take a listen to Tom Lomas, ABC.

Thousands of National Guard troops are on duty in Washington. By Wednesday, there will be 25,000 troops. Four bridges into the city will be closed. The streets are deserted. Storefronts are boarded up. Much of the National Mall is closed. The FBI is saying that last week's attack likely emboldened domestic extremists. And tonight, a new arrest.

Media personality Tim Giannette, known as Baked Alaska, allegedly spotted on video inside the Capitol chanting, quote, Patriots are in control. And Jenna Ryan, the Texas real estate broker who flew to D.C. in a private plane, now asking for a pardon, saying she doesn't feel guilty because she thought she was following the president. And it's not just Washington on alert tonight. At least 10 states activating the National Guard. You know what I hate, Colin P. Clark and Scott Taylor? I want everybody, Dr. Bethany, Wendy, Patrick, to weigh in on this, is the categorizing of these criminals that attacked the Capitol, categorizing them as what was said, they'll go home and eat at Olive Garden and stay at the Holiday Inn,

suggesting that they're lower middle class and educated. Number one, I really resent that because my dad and mom struggled their whole life to help us get through college and graduate school and more graduate school. And there's no way to categorize who these people are. More importantly, forget about my hurt feelings. What about the inauguration? Colin P. Clark, who are these people that are joining together to try to thwart our country? You've got this realtor.

You've got a judge's son. You've got that idiot baked Alaska. People from all walks of life joining together to attack our country. How can you prepare for that tomorrow? It's difficult. And I've also heard these people referred to as rubes and rednecks and all sorts of other— What if we want a private jet? That's not a rube or an illiterate—

No, it's not. I think what it shows you is that the—what I call the far right, far right extremists in this country. And that's a very broad tent, a very broad umbrella. And there's numerous subcategories in there. We could talk about any of those. But I think at any since since at any point in recent memory, this this movement has become more diversified geographically,economically and demographically and i think what we saw you know the capital was a cross-section of people from the united states and and i think you know we also we've been having this discussion and it would be disingenuous if we didn't mention the

role of the president because the president has falsely claimed the election was stolen he's refused to concede and he's cast the the Biden administration as illegitimate, which it's not. And he essentially has been the main provocateur of firing these people up and unleashing them. So, well, you know, that's an interesting thing. And I'm more concerned about the security of the inauguration and the president elect than I am about who did what. But as far as stirring up the seemingly normal citizens to attack our Capitol, but I do know this. Wendy Patrick, California prosecutor, I kept waiting to see if there was evidence of election fraud. Because if there was, I get the anger. But I never saw any substantial evidence to show me there was election fraud. I didn't dismiss it out of hand. I waited to see it. I

never saw it. But the other thing beyond that, Wendy Patrick, mind control. That doesn't hold up in a court of law. You can't say I stormed the Capitol because I thought he told me to. No, that is not a legal defense under the law. No, it's not a legal defense. And you wonder whether or not it was ever intended to be put forth as a legal defense. It sounds more like people's emotions got the better of them and they did things they knew they shouldn't have done, which is a very interesting component to the point that we're making about there being no demographic profile for the types of people that did this. That is why we monitor social media and digital chatter as much as we do, because you couldn't have picked these guys out of a crowd. There is nothing about their backgrounds, their history, their socioeconomic status that you would have thought would have predisposed them to do what they did. Certainly not some claim of mind control. So you're right. Accountability is what we're now seeing.

And all of that footage that we collected is now leading to arrest. The sight hardening, Nancy, that's going on today, I hope to God we'll have a peaceful transition tomorrow so we're not in the position of doing the same thing after the inauguration. Scott Taylor. Let me jump in here real quick. Hold on. Jump in, Colin. Go.

Was that Colin or Scott? This is Scott Taylor. Yeah, Scott, I was just going to you about the bridges closing and the tunnels closing because I know how that felt in New York after the attack. I couldn't leave. The planes weren't working. Unless I wanted to walk home to Georgia, I was stuck. Now, tell me that and other measures taken and whatever you were going to jump in with. Go ahead. Well, I want to jump in first and say, you know, when that all happened, I mean, I was in D.C. on January 6th and there was hundreds of thousands, 100,000, 100,000, 50, whatever the group was.

Not everybody stormed in there. And we all know that. And the FBI is is going through and picking out the people. We've been doing that at W.J.L.A. identifying we've identified about 17 people through social media. But I want to mention that you got to wonder how organized any of these groups are or if there are groups who showed up there and if they're talking on social media. But one thing I do know for certain, the National Park Police, Nancy, have curtailed the amount of permits it's issuing due to the security lockdown. In 2016, when I was here, there was 60 groups out on the streets protesting and there were permits that were issued and there were skirmishes between police and protesters. Right now, there's only two groups who applied for permits officially and only two have been approved.

They have to go through security. They only can have about 100 people and no interaction with each other. So I think they're trying as much as possible to keep a lid on any organized group protest. Back to Colin P. Clark. I know you're holding your cards close to the vest. Director of Policy Research, Soufan Group. Colin, how can you catch these people online, so-called chatter?

Well, it's difficult. I mean, there's, you know, civil liberties and First Amendment protections that American citizens have. And so that's a bit of a minefield to navigate. On top of that,

we don't have a domestic terrorism statute in this country. That's something that may change in a Biden administration. but there's a lot of issues there as well. You know, concerns. The reason we don't are, you know, kind of well-tread and including concerns over, you know, the president, any president. I'm not talking specifically about President Trump, but certainly would include him going after political rivals. Right. And so that's why we don't have one. Now, there's a bunch of other options on the table, including making domestic terrorism a federal crime. What we need to do is we need to give law enforcement more tools and

more resources to combat this threat. We talked just before about this being loosely organized. It's highly decentralized. But within this broader movement, there are organized groups. There are official militias. There's the Oath Keepers. There's the Three Percenters. You know, there's white supremacist groups like Adam Woffin, The Base, and others. So we know that these groups exist. We now have to have the political will to go after it. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Guys, we are talking about the inauguration going down, 24 hours and counting. Right now, the entire country on high alert after the attack on our Capitol. Straight back out to Scott Taylor joining us from ABC7 WJLA. Colin Clark playing it close to the vest about how the president and the vice president-elect are going to be protected.

But what do you know? I understand they're going to be using underground tunnels, bulletproof glass, a section cordoned off. There's not going to be a huge mall full of people right now. That mall has been planted with hundreds and hundreds of flags. What else are the protective measures that you know of, Scott? Well, I want to make a point real quick, Nancy. You know, the security level just rose today. We're not talking about today. And the reason why I say that is because President-elect Biden

and Vice President-elect Harris are arriving today in D.C. So security has stepped up. And I also want to mention that we talked about how is President-elect Biden getting to D.C. So security has stepped up. And I also want to mention that we talked about how is President-elect Biden getting to D.C.? Well, usually, you know, Nancy would take a train. He's done that for years from where he lives into D.C. That's been canceled due to security reasons. I don't want to go into exactly how he's getting here either. But I do know tonight he and President-elect Vice President Harris is going to be attending a National Mall ceremony to honor COVID victims. So security jumped up sky high today as we head into tomorrow.

And tomorrow, you mentioned, that's all the security that's going on. And I think what's really important is to talk about they're going to do a lot of this virtually. You're not going to see everything like you usually do. And that's due to the security concerns in D.C. today and tomorrow. Colum P. Clark, Asufan Group, the president can't hide. He cannot hide. He's got to be out there. There's no way he can hide.

Right? Yeah, and I don't think he should hide. I think, you know, I'm actually just seeing this on Twitter news from a colleague of mine who lives on Capitol Hill. If there's a bomb threat just today and that people are being asked to stay inside while the FBI investigates a suspicious package. Yes, we had a fire. Yeah, Colin, yeah, we had that fire yesterday, and that's one really good security test. They were practicing the inauguration ceremony and cleared everybody out within minutes, and it ended up being a fire, a gentleman in a homeless encampment. But that was a really good test. Now, quickly, they moved everybody out and into secure bunkers. But I'm talking about today as well, just as of 20 minutes ago, another bomb threat on Capitol Hill.

So, you know, people are tense and on edge and, you know, things that might be considered normal in ordinary circumstances are going to be treated much differently now and for the next couple of days. Colin Clark, exactly. My point. Dr. Bethany Marshall, there was a time where the people that broke into, attacked our Capitol may have gotten a slap on the wrist. Okay. I don't think we can do that. I would have done it to start with. But, for instance, whoever called in a bomb threat that Colin P. Clark just told us about, the fire, as it turned out, and the recent hours turned out to be not a threat, but still, whoever is calling in a bomb threat, everyone that takes a single action against this inauguration must be charged to the fullest extent of the law. There's got to be a deterrent. Well, you know, Nancy, Colin P. Clark has been studying this for years, but now we're getting a lesson as a nation and how serious all of these attacks are, the motivations for the attack. And you've been framing it as criminal. And it is absolutely true. It's like the Me Too movement. You know,

people who aggressed against women, you know, two decades ago got a slap on the wrist. Well, now we see it for what it is, this predatory behavior. We have reframed our thinking. And it's the same with domestic terrorism. This term has been thrown around again and again. What is a domestic terrorist? It's not just somebody who was standing on the White House lawn and got caught up in a crowd and then, oops, I just, you know, put my foot through the front door just to see what was going on inside. No, these are people who had intent. And Nancy, this is not a low socioeconomic group, as some of the reporters have been saying. These are the people who had the wherewithal to get on a bus, get on a plane. They have computers.

They have arms. They have means to congregate. Our immigrants, our disenfranchised people were not in that crowd. Lower socioeconomic people were not in that crowd. These were people of privilege with homicidal intent. I want to follow up on what you said with Colin Clark. The need for pseudo-intellectuals to classify them, to categorize them as unintelligent, uneducated, low-income, I guess, crowd, somehow it minimizes, it minimizes the danger. Because you've got people with college degrees, with five-figure, maybe six-figure incomes

that are attacking our country. And the problem, Colin, we can't pick them out of a crowd. In the past, you may have thought, well, they're a nut. They're a right-wing nut. You know, they're a militia person in quotas. It's turned dangerous now, Colin. What can we do, Colin? Well, I mean, it makes sense for people to look for a typology, right,

because it gives them comfort. You know, we've long struggled with this issue in the United States. It's why we named, you know, after 9-11, we called it the global war on terrorism. We want to simplify things. It never made sense because what is war against a tactic, right? In World War II, we didn't declare a war against blitzkrieg. So we try to simplify things. We try to make sense of them as humans. As social scientists, we try to do the same thing. But what we fail to understand is that there's no silver bullet. There's no one size fits all for the radicalization process. And that's what we've seen happen in this country.

We've seen individuals radicalize, and that happens for all different reasons. People want to mock the fact that, oh, that doesn't look like economic anxiety to me. She took a personal jet there. Right, that lady's not suffering from economic anxiety. But I also think it's, you know, we can't just dismiss this as the emotions got the better of them. You know, if my emotions get the better of me, I don't storm, you know, the U.S. Capitol. They committed an act of insurrection. So, you know, the fact that they were there in the first place and willing to break the law, you know, they should be punished. And I think that's one thing that we need to see in this country is accountability. We often see it at the lower

levels. We rarely see it at the top. That's not only in the government. It's on Wall Street. It's in Hollywood. It's elsewhere. So without accountability, we won't be able to stem the flow of what comes next. Nancy, that's where predisposition comes in. You know, I mentioned both provocation and predisposition. These people showed up at a rally in riot gear. That's what you and I and other prosecutors would call intent. They didn't intend to go someplace and peacefully protest. They intended not just to be vocal, but to be violent.

That would be the argument that is being used to prosecute some of these people now yes clearly intent and on that same note wendy patrick california prosecutor at wendypatrickphd.com wendy i have said repeatedly that the people that stormed the capitol should be charged with felony murder that The cause of that, Officer Sicknick, is dead. Yeah, that's exactly right. That's felony murder. They're in a commission of a felony. He's killed. That's the textbook definition of felony murder.

And that seems to be what prosecutors are agreeing they're going to do because that's exactly right. A crime, a murder committed in the commission of certain enumerated felonies makes it felony murder. And that's significant because you don't have to have intended for the person to die to be guilty under that theory, Nancy. And that's exactly what prosecutors are looking at in connection with the death of the Capitol policeman.

You're so right. Tomorrow, everyone, the country on edge as we approach the presidential inauguration, regardless of which side of the fence you stand on. We all agree on one thing. God bless America. Nancy Grace, Crime Story, signing off. Goodbye, friend.