Infowars Receives More Bad News From Supreme Court
Expect more crocodile tears from Alex Jones: Right-wing conspiracy theorist and Alex Jones underling Owen Shroyer lost his petition for the Supreme Court to overturn the conviction for his participation in the January 6 Capitol riot on Monday, according to Supreme Court documents reviewed by Politico reporter Kyle Cheney.Shroyer, who hosts a show on far-right website Infowars, was originally sentenced to a mere 60 days in federal prison for misdemeanor charges of entering restricted grounds and leading the mob in chants outside the U.S. Capitol ahead of the January 6 Capitol riot—charges to which he pleaded guilty. Prior to January 6, Shroyer used the once-sizable Infowars platform to spew violent, inciting rhetoric and election-denialist propaganda to hundreds of thousands of people.Shroyer’s gambit sought to grift on his misdemeanor, claiming in videos that his Supreme Court appeal was a test of whether the Supreme Court supports “free speech,” which in Shroyer’s case is more commonly known as “trespassing.”Shroyer filed a writ of certiorari, a type of petition sent to the Supreme Court as a last-ditch effort to appeal a lower court’s ruling. As Shroyer was sentenced by a federal court and not a state court, his appeal request went directly to the highest court in the country. Technically, any guilty verdict of a criminal case can file an appeal—but pleading guilty, as Shroyer did, certainly doesn’t help.The Supreme Court’s denial of Shroyer’s petition suggests other convicted Capitol rioters who may be inclined to attempt to submit gimmicky appeals to the Supreme Court will find themselves similarly rejected.
Expect more crocodile tears from Alex Jones: Right-wing conspiracy theorist and Alex Jones underling Owen Shroyer lost his petition for the Supreme Court to overturn the conviction for his participation in the January 6 Capitol riot on Monday, according to Supreme Court documents reviewed by Politico reporter Kyle Cheney.
Shroyer, who hosts a show on far-right website Infowars, was originally sentenced to a mere 60 days in federal prison for misdemeanor charges of entering restricted grounds and leading the mob in chants outside the U.S. Capitol ahead of the January 6 Capitol riot—charges to which he pleaded guilty. Prior to January 6, Shroyer used the once-sizable Infowars platform to spew violent, inciting rhetoric and election-denialist propaganda to hundreds of thousands of people.
Shroyer’s gambit sought to grift on his misdemeanor, claiming in videos that his Supreme Court appeal was a test of whether the Supreme Court supports “free speech,” which in Shroyer’s case is more commonly known as “trespassing.”
Shroyer filed a writ of certiorari, a type of petition sent to the Supreme Court as a last-ditch effort to appeal a lower court’s ruling. As Shroyer was sentenced by a federal court and not a state court, his appeal request went directly to the highest court in the country. Technically, any guilty verdict of a criminal case can file an appeal—but pleading guilty, as Shroyer did, certainly doesn’t help.
The Supreme Court’s denial of Shroyer’s petition suggests other convicted Capitol rioters who may be inclined to attempt to submit gimmicky appeals to the Supreme Court will find themselves similarly rejected.
