Democrat congressman’s staffer caught defacing posters in Capitol complex, but DOJ won't prosecute

Case of Rep. Jake Auchincloss’s chief of staff certain to renew debate about dual justice system after same U.S. attorney's office that prosecuted J6 defendant declines the case.

Capitol Police caught Massachusetts Democrat Rep. Jake Auchincloss’s chief of staff defacing posters outside the Capitol complex office of Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and referred him for criminal charges, but the same U.S. Attorney's office that pursued the Jan. 6 defendants declined to approve an arrest warrant, according to police documents and interviews.

Capitol Police asked federal prosecutors back in March for an arrest warrant for Timothy Hysom, 51, a longtime Democrat congressional staffer who worked for Rep. Adam Schiff before rising to be Auchincloss’s top aide, after capturing Hysom on hidden camera security footage defacing Greene’s posters with stickers with religious messages, according to copy of the arrest warrant obtained by Just the News.

Police said they believed Hysom may have been involved in seven defacing of posters outside Greene's office in the Longworth Congressional Office Building between January and March and that he declined to be interviewed when confronted. Hysom was offered a "non-custodial interview and he declined and retained counsel," the report states.

"Based on the aforementioned, it is your affiant's belief that the defendant, Timothy Duane Hysom … did violate DC Code § 22–3312.01 Defacing Public or Private Property,” the arrest warrant stated.

You can read the warrant here.

File

USCP-Arrest Warrant-Tim-Hyman03-22.pdf

Officials told Just the News that Greene was informed last month that the U.S. attorney's office in Washington, D.C., which has been the lead prosecutor on Jan. 6 crimes, declined prosecution because it did not believe a federal judge would allow the case to proceed.

Greene declined comment Monday, saying she would be making a statement Tuesday.

Hysom did not immediately return an email seeking comment Monday, but Auchincloss' spokesperson sent Just the News a statement confirming the defacing had occurred but insisting that treating it as a crime was "ridiculous."

Spokesman Matt Corridoni said the real victims were people forced to read Greene's posters that stated there are only two genders – male and female – calling the message "bullying."

"While Members of Congress have great latitude in what they do on the inside of their office, they do not own the exterior walls of their office," Corridoni said. "Regulations published by the House Buildings Commission prohibit 'posters' from being posted in the hallways outside of Members' House offices in the House Office Buildings. Adhering a sticker – to a poster that shouldn't be there in the first place – is hardly a federal crime.

"What Tim did was to adhere a series of stickers to foul, mean spirited, bullying posters outside the Congresswoman's office. These stickers were never threatening and always respectful.

https://justthenews.com/government/congress/democrat-congressmans-staffer-caught-defacing-posters-capitol-complex-doj-wont