D.C. pipe bomb suspect wants a presidential pardon

The Virginia man accused of placing pipe bombs at the Republican and Democratic national headquarters on the eve of the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol says he deserves the same clemency as the rioters.

Attorneys for suspect Brian Cole Jr. said their client fits the narrative the White House used to pardon the roughly 1,500 people linked to the riot — that his alleged actions revolved around issues with the 2020 election.

“Brian Cole’s conduct is so inextricably and demonstrably tethered to the events at or near the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021, that he must be pardoned pursuant to applicable Presidential Pardon of January 20, 2025,” according to court documents filed by the defendant’s legal team.

The filing said Mr. Cole deserves the same pardon that David Dempsey received, who prosecutors called “one of the most violent rioters” during the riot. Mr. Dempsey’s sentencing memorandum said he used flag poles, crutches and broken pieces of furniture to assault police during the chaotic initial breach of the Capitol building.

The memorandum noted that Mr. Dempsey, who has a lengthy criminal record, fired pepper spray into the face of a Metropolitan Police detective on the scene. He then swung a metal crutch at another Metropolitan Police officer, causing the officer to collapse.

Mr. Dempsey stomped on the heads of police officers who had fallen to the ground in the chaos, the memorandum said. He was sentenced to 20 years behind bars before President Trump pardoned him last year.

Another man, Kenneth Harrelson, was granted a pardon despite being accused of having people stationed outside city limits to bring firearms onto Capitol grounds, had the rioters needed them.

Mr. Cole’s attorneys appeared to make the lack of pardon a racial issue, noting that Harrelson and Dempsey are both White men.

“The Pardon — like it or not — applies to Mr. Cole, based on the ordinary and plain meaning of the Pardon’s language as applied to the relevant facts in this case,” his defense team wrote. “Wherefore, for the reasons stated above, Mr. Cole requests that this Motion be granted and the charges against him dismissed, in their entirety.”

Mr. Cole’s arrest in December closed a case that had gone cold for nearly five years after grainy surveillance footage captured a hooded suspect placing the bombs at the two buildings.

Charging documents said Mr. Cole confessed to investigators that he constructed and positioned the bombs on Jan. 5, 2021. He detailed to federal agents how he crafted the devices, and he shared that they were timed to detonate 60 minutes after he planted them, the documents said.

Mr. Cole told investigators that he’s not a “political person” and that he doesn’t like either political party, according to the charging documents, but after consuming information about the 2020 election on YouTube and Reddit, he said that “something just snapped.”

The filings said he felt elected leaders needed to address people’s concerns about voter fraud, and not cast any skeptics of the election’s integrity as “Nazis” or “conspiracy theorists.”

“I didn’t agree with what people were doing, like just telling half the country that they … just need to ignore it,” Mr. Cole said, according to court documents. “I didn’t think that was a good idea, so I went to the protest.”

The defendant said he was inspired to make the bombs by their use during “The Troubles” in Ireland, a years-long conflict between Protestants and Catholics. He allegedly purchased material for the explosives between 2018 and 2020.

Neither bomb exploded — one of which Vice President Kamala Harris passed by unknowingly — and Mr. Cole allegedly told investigators that he was relieved there was no explosion.

Mr. Cole’s attorneys wanted the confession turned over following his preliminary hearing in December.