Judge blasts complaints about Capitol riot prison conditions: ‘It’s a jail not a hotel’

A Capitol riot defendant appears to be fabricating accusations of medical mistreatment by jailers, prosecutors say

A District of Columbia judge has had enough with Capitol rioters’ complaints about the detention facility where they are being held while awaiting trial after court documents revealed that one high-profile complainer may have fabricated his medical needs.

According to Yahoo News, US District Judge Emmett Sullivan responded to one defendant’s gripes about the conditions by noting that the DC Department of Corrections is “running a jail, not a hotel”.

“Some people want hotel services,” the judge observed.

Many Republicans have seized on an order from another DC judge, Roy Lambeth, holding DC DOC Director Quincy Booth in contempt for failing to turn over defendant Christopher Worrell’s medical records as evidence that officials are deliberately mistreating prisoners held on charges relating to the 6 January attack on the Capitol.

But a document filed with the court on Wednesday casts doubt on claims that Mr Worrell was being mistreated, deliberately or otherwise.

Mr Worrell, a member of the neo-fascist Proud Boys gang who faces several criminal charges related to his participation in the 6 January insurrection, has alleged in court documents that jail officials deliberately withheld medical treatment for cancer and a broken pinky finger.

But prosecutors now say that Mr Worrell previously declined the non-medically necessary surgery that would have corrected his finger months before he travelled to Washington to attack the Capitol in hopes of disrupting Congress’ certification of President Joe Biden’s electoral college victory.

While Mr Worrell does suffer from cancer, the Justice Department says he had asked for a second opinion before beginning the chemotherapy he accuses the government of denying him.

“The government has repeatedly been unable to sort fact from fiction in reviewing Mr. Worrell’s many claims of medical mistreatment, because those claims have often been refuted, or at best unsubstantiated, by the medical notes and records that the government later obtains,” prosecutors wrote.