Tuesday, February 18, 2025

Court dismisses Jan. 6 charges of one local, leaves door open for future case

Justina Guardino identified by the FBI standing outside the U.S. Capital on Jan. 6, before entering the building through a window.

NEW HANOVER COUNTY — Trespassing and obstruction of government proceedings charges against the former New Hanover County Moms for Liberty vice chair have been dismissed in federal court.

READ MORE: ‘Akin to a tour’: NHC Moms for Liberty vice chair defends presence on Capitol, arrested for Jan. 6

On Jan. 23, Judge Beryl Howell granted a dismissal of the misdemeanor charges against 32-year-old Justina Guardino; federal prosecutors with the Trump Administration filed the motion for dismissal in the wake of President Donald Trump’s executive order pardoning all people, numbering over 1,500, that participated in the Jan. 6 insurrection.

Guardino was arrested in Wilmington on Sept. 12 for violating federal law when she joined thousands of protesters surrounding the Capitol as Congress was certifying the 2020 election results. The insurrection, led by those protesting Trump’s reelection loss, disrupted the count and resulted in 174 injuries to police, five of whom died on Jan. 6 or in the days and weeks immediately after.  

The investigation was aided by the FBI, which obtained video footage Guardino entering the Capitol building through a busted window. Guardino confirmed her identity in some of the images presented to her in an August 2023 interview with the FBI.

Guardino was charged with:

  • knowingly entering and remaining in the U.S. Capitol, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1752(a)(1)
  • knowingly, and with intent to impede and disrupt the orderly conduct of official functions, engaging in disorderly and disruptive conduct in the Capitol, and actually so impeding those functions, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1752(a)(2)
  • willfully and knowingly engaging in disorderly and disruptive conduct in the Capitol with the intent to impede, disrupt, and disturb the orderly conduct of Congress, in violation of 40 U.S.C. § 5104(e)(2)(D)
  • willfully and knowingly parading, demonstrating, and picketing in a Capitol building, in violation of 40 U.S.C. § 5104(e)(2)(G)

Though each charge was dismissed, Judge Howell did so “without prejudice,” which essenitally means the charges could be brought against Guardino again in the future.

Howell said a dismissal with prejudice, as requested by federal prosecutors, “would be improper here, particularly given the strength of the evidence supporting the defendant’s illegal entry into the Capitol building, which evidence provides ample basis for criminal prosecution.”

Howell indicated her disagreement with the argument made by the prosecutors in their motion and the assertions made in Turmp’s executive order, on which the motion is based.

“The government’s cursory motion provides no factual basis for dismissal,” Howell wrote in her ruling.

She writes the government’s single paragraph justification for dismissal only cites Trump’s executive order (as opposed to, say, other court cases).

Additionally, the order justifies dismissing Jan. 6 participants’ charges as remedying a “grave national injustice that has been perpetrated upon the American people over the last four years and begins a process of national reconciliation.”

Howell states no national injustice has occurred and no national reconciliation can occur when “sore losers” get let off the hook and praised for disrupting government proceedings. That leads people to believe they can get away with future lawless conduct, Howell asserts.

“This Court cannot let stand the revisionist myth relayed in this presidential pronouncement,” Howell said.

However, the judge acknowledged the D.C. circuit has mandated a district court has no power to deny a prosecutor’s dismissal request “based on a disagreement with the prosecution’s exercise of charging authority.”

Essentially, Howell’s hands are tied on the matter.

Due to Trump’s order, Guardino will now join the hundreds of people now free of charges or judicial sentences, some of which have since committed other crimes.

A North Carolina man who was set free from prison after assaulting a police officer on Jan. 6 is now facing child sexual assault and child pornography charges involving two young girls in his family, one prepubescent and one under the age of 12. A Texas man pardoned and released from prison under is now wanted by authorities on a 2016 charge of soliciting a minor online.

An Indiana man was fatally shot by police after resisting arrest and starting an “altercation” with an officer.


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