In a move that could overturn many of the prosecutions related to the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot, the Supreme Court on Friday narrowed the scope of the obstruction of justice charge.
In a 6-3 decision, with Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson joining the conservative majority and Justice Amy Coney Barrett siding with the liberal dissenters, the Supreme Court concluded that prosecutors needed to stick closer to the statutory language of the obstruction charge used in the January 6 indictment.
“The government must prove that the defendant impaired or attempted to impair the availability or integrity for use in the official proceeding of records, documents, objects, or other things used in the proceeding, as described above,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in the majority opinion.
At issue was a technical interpretation of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, which provides that any person who “alter, destroy, mutilate or conceal, any record, document or other object so as to impair its integrity or make it unfit for use in any official proceeding, or who obstructs, affects or impedes, any official proceeding, or who attempts to do so, is criminally liable.”
The charge has been used in more than 300 prosecutions related to the Capitol attack.
