(Ken Silva, Headline USA) US District Judge Matthew Sharbaugh ruled Friday that Brian Cole Jr., who’s accused of planting two pipe bombs near the RNC and DNC headquarters the night before the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol Hill protest, is to remain in jail—despite the fact that Cole has not been federally indicted.
Judge Sharbaugh’s decision stems from a controversy over the fact that the FBI arrested Cole on Dec. 4, but prosecutors didn’t secure an indictment before the DC federal grand jury closed for the holidays starting on Dec. 19.
Cole had a detention hearing on Tuesday. The day before, the Justice Department indicted Cole in the local DC Superior Court. But Cole’s lawyers said the local indictment was invalid because it circumvented the federal grand jury process. The lawyers argued that their client be released as a result.
Judge Sharbaugh denied their request on Friday. Despite the lack of federal indictment, probable cause still exists to keep Cole detained, he said.
“The facts proffered to the Court in connection with the detention hearing, including the government’s description of Mr. Cole’s own reported statements to law enforcement during his post-arrest interview, provide an ample basis to conclude, at least for present purposes, that there is probable cause to believe Mr. Cole … maliciously attempted to damage or destroy, by means of fire and explosive materials, real or personal property affecting interstate commerce (namely, the DNC and RNC headquarters),” the judge’s order said.
Meanwhile, the federal grand jury is set to reopen this Tuesday, and prosecutors have indicated that they will present the Cole case for indictment that day.
Cole is set to have a status hearing next Friday.
Cole was arrested on the morning of Dec. 4 at his Woodbridge, Virginia, house in what law enforcement officials described as a major breakthrough in their nearly five-year-old investigation. During a search of Cole’s home and car after his arrest, prosecutors say, investigators found shopping bags of bomb-making components. He at first denied having manufactured or placed the pipe bombs, but later confessed during an hour-long interview.
At Tuesday’s detention hearing, prosecutors urged the judge to keep Cole confined as he awaits trial. They said he’s a danger to the community, given his interest in explosives. Cole allegedly wiped his phone of data 934 times, showing that he has a pattern of hiding and destroying evidence, they added.
Cole’s attorneys begged to differ. They said he’s autistic and has OCD, and that the devices he allegedly built were duds. The defense lawyers said they have an expert witness who will testify that the so-called bombs “cannot explode and are not viable.”
Pipe Bomb Case History
As Headline USA revealed in March 2024, the FBI had a suspect identified by Jan. 10, 2021 in the pipe bomb case, but didn’t make an arrest at the time.
FBI records released in September revealed that agents didn’t interview the woman who discovered a pipe bomb near the RNC around 12:40 p.m. on Jan. 6 until days later. That woman, former counterterrorism analyst and then-Commerce Department worker Karlin Younger, said she found the bomb while doing laundry.
Meanwhile, former Vice President Kamala Harris continues to be tight-lipped on the subject, despite the fact that her motorcade drove past the DNC pipe bomb on Jan. 6. Harris left the Capitol at 11:21 a.m. arrived to the DNC at 11:25 a.m., but the nearby pipe bomb wasn’t discovered until 1:07 p.m. by a plainclothes Capitol Police officer.
The bizarre circumstances have driven many to suspect that it may have been a false-flag attempt overseen by the feds themselves to divert law enforcement from the Capitol right as the Jan. 6 protest was turning violent.
Rep. Morgan Griffith, R-Va., has said that it may be impossible to successfully prosecute the pipe bomber.
“Here’s what a good criminal defense attorney’s going to say: If you identified the individual who’s believed to place the bomb, then hours go by, and you had a search by the Secret Service at the DNC and the dog didn’t find the explosive—so clearly, the device [the defense attorney’s] client might have left there wasn’t the device that was determined to be the pipe bomb, because it wasn’t picked up by the bomb-sniffing dog,” Griffith argued in March 2024.
Ken Silva is the editor of Headline USA. Follow him at x.com/jd_cashless.
