The fur-clad and face-painted demonstrator who became one of the most prominent symbols of last week’s rampage through the U.S. Capitol is asking for a pardon.
An attorney for Jacob Anthony Chansley, aka “QAnon Shaman,” said his client deserves a pardon from President Trump because he was following the president’s exhortations.
Albert Watkins says his client was not involved in Wednesday’s violence, surrendered peacefully, and only traveled to Washington in response to Mr. Trump’s call that patriots should make clear their displeasure at a stolen election.
“My client had heard the oft-repeated words of President Trump. The words and invitation of a president are supposed to mean something,” Mr. Watkins said, according to St. Louis CBS affiliate KMOV-4.
“Given the peaceful and compliant fashion in which Mr. Chansley comported himself, it would be appropriate and honorable for the president to pardon Mr. Chansley and other like-minded, peaceful individuals who accepted the president’s invitation with honorable intentions,” the lawyer said.
Mr. Chansley became famous (or infamous) because he stood out from the crowd owing to his horned-hay costume, his painted red-white-and-blue face and his border-wall arm tattoos.
An indictment unsealed Tuesday in Washington charged the 33-year-old man with civil disorder, obstruction of an official proceeding, disorderly conduct in a restricted building, and demonstrating in a Capitol building.
