May 7, 2024
MOVCAC Contributor: Sean P. Keefe
Eric Barber – J6 Persecution
Prosecution or Persecution? Funny how those two words only differ by two letters – they are very similar verbs with two distinctly different outcomes. Our government is given authority and bottomless budgets presumably because no price can be put on justice. Our justice system and legal processes are given authority because we believe in law and order. However, when that system is being run by criminals, persecution and disorder become the rule.
Prosecution
Defined by Merriam-Webster as:
The act or process of prosecuting
specifically: the institution and continuance of a criminal suit involving the process of pursuing formal charges against an offender to final judgment
Eric Barber attended the January 6th rally at the Capitol. He pled guilty to a federal charge of parading and one count of theft for taking a phone charging station from a C-SPAN set up while in the Capitol. For these crimes, Mr. Barber was sentenced to 45 days in federal prison for the parading charge and two years of probation for the theft of the phone charger. You can find the details of his pleadings in the coverage provided by the Parkersburg News and Sentinel.
Barber sentenced to 45 days for role in Capitol riot – June 17, 2022
Like many people in 2020, Mr. Barber believed the presidential election was stolen, and he went to Washington D.C. that day to make his voice heard. It’s really weird how the FBI and DOJ can find Mr. Barber and many other patriots who were coaxed and cajoled into action that day, but for some reason, those same jackbooted “investigators” cannot find the perpetrators of the pipe bombs at the RNC or DNC.
The Plot Thickens: Damning New Details Emerge in Jan 6 Pipe Bomb Cover Up – Revolver News January 31, 2024
As you can clearly see from the News and Sentinel article linked above, Mr. Barber readily admitted to his guilt, felt remorse, and understood the gravity of his actions. As part of his sentencing, was he supposed to grovel and change his opinion regarding the evidence of criminal activity at the national level? Because he did wrong that day, is he required to relinquish his God-given right to free speech? After sentencing, Mr. Barber naturally reacted; and his reaction was clearly tinged with his knowledge that others have done far worse than he – and they were still roaming the halls of Congress. From the Parkersburg News and Sentinel article linked above:
Barber disagreed with the sentence.
“A stolen phone charger is nothing compared to a stolen election,” he said Tuesday in response to a request for comment following the hearing. “Any crimes I committed Jan. 6 pale in comparison to the lifelong criminal enterprise Nancy Pelosi has engaged in during her decades in Congress.”
Barber said the outcome would have been different had his judge been appointed by former President Donald Trump.
“I would have received no jail sentence,” he said. “Unfortunately, I had (an) Obama appointee and as a result, I’ll have to do six weeks in a minimum-security facility as a political prisoner.”
You may disagree with what Mr. Barber said, but you cannot disagree with his right to say those things.
Mr. Barber will tell you himself that he has a checkered past. He has had his issues with law enforcement and incarceration. These events occurred early in his life; and as his election to the Parkersburg City Council shows, he had faced his demons and come out on the other side as a productive member of our society.
Mr. Barber was sentenced by a federal judge for the local charge of theft of a phone charger. The two years of probation were given in place of a seven-day jail term. Throughout his federal incarceration, Mr. Barber felt he might be better served if he violated his probation and just served the seven-day sentence. Serving the incarceration would then complete his sentencing and get him out from under the thumb of the legal system. As Mr. Barber was exiting prison upon completion of the 45 days, he asked if he could just stick around for another week to satisfy the seven-day (or two years of probation) sentence from the stolen phone charger. He was told that had never been asked, and they didn’t know how to proceed with his request.
He was eventually stopped for a traffic violation and was identified as having violated his probation. A hearing for this violation was held in May 2023 at which time, the Judge voiced his displeasure with Mr. Barber’s comments after the original sentencing. He placed Mr. Barber in jail for three days. During this three-day incarceration, Mr. Barber was roughed up by the staff at the holding facility and had to attend his subsequent hearing in a wheelchair. No other prisoner touched him.
At this next hearing, the judge ordered him to six months of home confinement for the probation violation and threatened to modify his sentencing so that instead of a seven-day sentence; if he violated the conditions of his probation, he would extend the incarceration to 170 days. Mr. Barber completed his home confinement in October of 2023 and had a little more than one year left of his probation. Not wanting to end up back in jail for 170 days, Mr. Barber tried to play along.
As a recap – Mr. Barber pled guilty to parading in the Capitol and to stealing a phone charger. In response, he was sentenced to 45 days in federal prison and two years of probation, jailed for three days on a probation violation, and was assaulted. The day after January 6, 2021, he was fired from his job as a heating and air-conditioning technician and later that spring had his home raided by federal agents with body armor and weapons out. These agents held his wife and children at gunpoint while they turned their home upside down. During his home confinement, a federal official visited his home every two weeks. He has been unable to keep a job fitting his experience/training and has become a ward of the state. He has been on every kind of welfare for which he could apply and has had to resort to many charities to feed his family and put diapers on his child.
Whatever one may think Eric Barber did, have we not expended enough scarce resources on parading and petit larceny charges? Has his life not been turned upside down enough?
Apparently not.
Persecution
Defined by Merriam-Webster as:
the act or practice of persecuting especially those who differ in origin, religion, or social outlook
the condition of being persecuted, harassed, or annoyed
We have watched riots by BLM and Antifa over the last ten years where property damage and physical assaults have been ignored. We have witnessed a vice presidential candidate support the release of violent offenders. We see daily videos of people ransacking retail stores and running out with as much merchandise as their hands can hold. Random women are being punched on the streets of New York. We know that countless illegal immigrants are being settled throughout the country by our government. Over 11,000 extra West Virginians have died between 2020 and 2022, and no one in West Virginia is investigating.
Spending all of these resources on petit larceny and parading seems more like persecution than prosecution when we look at all the criminality that goes unprosecuted and uninvestigated. Hunter Biden videoed himself on crack, naked with trafficked women, waving an illegally purchased handgun. Where is the swat unit to terrorize his wife and children?
Acting as if 45 days in federal prison and two years of probation, financial ruin, and societal rejection was not enough punishment for Mr. Barber, Judge Christopher Cooper decided that another hearing for probation violations (specifically, use of marijuana with a medical card, and missing mental health counseling) is necessary. On May 2, 2024, Mr. Barber received a notice that a hearing has been set for May 9, 2024. One week’s notice for a broke parade participant to prepare for the possibility of being incarcerated again.
Lawyers, bailiffs, courtrooms, federal law enforcement, raids with guns out and trained on children, anal inspections, leg irons and handcuffs, home confinement, financial ruin, physical assault while incarcerated, and constant fear of new charges or further incarceration – ALL FOR PARADING AND THEFT OF A PHONE CHARGER!
Whether you like what Mr. Barber did or not, you must acknowledge that our government has spent more time and resources on Mr. Barber’s parading than they have on finding the individuals who planted pipe bombs at both the RNC and DNC on January 6. That guy is on video as well. We are witnessing a two-tiered justice system on display – not only in courtrooms in Georgia, Florida, Washington D.C., and New York – we have evidence of selective, and over-prosecution right here in our hometown.
Please pray for Mr. Barber and all those well-meaning Patriots who love their country and who are being persecuted by our government. Call your congressmen and senators and demand that all footage from January 6 be made available to the public. That footage is yours. The government that is supposed to represent you has no right to keep, what in many cases will prove to be, exculpatory evidence hidden from public view.
Mr. Barber made a mistake – one he readily admits. He has been punished for that mistake. Do you think that further persecution of Mr. Barber and all other January 6 defendants is the best use of the resources your government takes from you?
May 9, 2024 Hearing
If you’ve never been to jail, you may not be aware of how you must prepare. They take everything from you – your wallet, your keys, your clothes. Eric had been prepared by his lawyer to expect another incarceration. He drove himself to D.C. and found a place in a neighborhood where he could park his car and hope that if he were jailed, his car would be in the same spot when he got out. He gave his phone and wallet to his lawyer (in case it was a long incarceration), but left some cash, his keys, and an extra phone in his car in case he got out of jail over the weekend. This way, he could still get back home and have a way to call his wife.
Again, he had been prepared by his lawyer to expect a long incarceration based on the judge’s earlier reactions. In the hearing, there were discussions of another home confinement that would last until his probation was over. It was determined that there was no legal framework that would allow the judge to extend his incarceration past his originally decided seven-day incarceration or two-year probation sentence.
In the end, Mr. Barber was remanded by the U.S. Marshals to complete his seven-day sentence over the weekend (he had already served three days from the May 2023 hearing). By completing this sentence in custody, Mr. Barber is no longer restricted by probation and is now, as he says, “free and clear.” Upon release, Mr. Barber was given a prepaid metro card and walked out the door. He had no idea where he was in relation to where he parked (the holding facility and the courthouse where the hearing occurred were not in the same place). He began walking hoping that he would find a landmark to tell him where he was, and give him a little hint as to the direction he needed to go to find his vehicle. Luckily, within ten minutes he found the street where his car was parked.
Mr. Barber has completed his sentences. For parading and theft of a phone charger, Mr. Barber spent 52 days incarcerated in federal custody, six months on home confinement, and a year and a half on probation restrictions. Again, that sure seems like a ton of federal resources used to punish a citizen for a nonviolent political offense. That is not prosecution, it is persecution. A free society should not accept this behavior from its government officials.
You live in a society where parading and taking a phone charger will result in incarceration, assault, home confinement, the confiscation of your shoelaces and belt, and you being bent over and having your butthole checked to ensure you aren’t packed with paraphernalia – IF YOUR POLITICAL BELIEFS DIFFER FROM THE REGIME.
Conclusion:
I’ll bet when you were growing up you never thought your government would prioritize foreign wars and prosecution of government dissenters over-delivering safe streets, border security, and a sound financial system.
Welcome to 1984 with Eric Barber playing the role of Winston. If we don’t reject our current path, one day you may find yourself in Eric’s shoes.
Sean Keefe can be reached at [email protected]
