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David Nicholas Dempsey

January 6 case-file subject

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David Nicholas Dempsey is a Van Nuys man - San Fernando Valley, Los Angeles - who worked construction and worked restaurant jobs, the kind of labor that builds a city and never gets a byline. He drew one of the longest January 6 sentences in the country. He is home now. WHO HE IS FACT - Dempsey is a resident of Van Nuys in the City of Los Angeles, and was 37 years old at the time of his sentencing (FOX 11 Los Angeles; Patch Los Angeles). FACT - Reporting at sentencing described his work history as construction and fast-food restaurant employment - a working-class Valley resume, not a professional or political one. THEIR ACCOUNT - His defense attorney, Amy Collins, asked the court for 78 months and told the judge the government recommendation reduced a human being to a number. Her words: it makes him a statistic, and it does not consider the person he is, or how much he has grown. DOCUMENTED INFERENCE - Growth is the argument his own lawyer put on the record in open court. This archive records it, because it is the only account anyone offered of David Dempsey as a person, and it belongs next to everything else. THE LEGAL FIGHT FACT - Dempsey was arrested August 26, 2021 and pleaded guilty to two felony counts of assaulting officers with a dangerous weapon under 18 U.S.C. section 111(a)(1) and (b). FACT - On August 9, 2024, U.S. District Judge Royce C. Lamberth sentenced him to 240 months - 20 years - plus 36 months of supervised release and $2,000 in restitution. It was the second-longest sentence handed down in any January 6 case (NPR; DOJ). FACT - On January 20, 2025, David Dempsey received a full and unconditional presidential pardon under the January 6 clemency proclamation, and the DOJ Office of the Pardon Attorney lists him among pardon-certificate recipients. FACT - He served roughly three and a half years in custody between his 2021 arrest and the 2025 pardon. A 20-year federal sentence is the kind of number that ends a life on paper. His ended on January 20, 2025 instead. He is a pardoned January 6 defendant with a clean slate on that conviction, and what he builds from here is his to build. CASE RECORD Name: David Nicholas Dempsey Hometown: Van Nuys, Los Angeles, California Case number: 1:21-cr-00566-RCL Court: U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia Judge: Royce C. Lamberth Arrest: August 26, 2021 Sentence: August 9, 2024 - 240 months Clemency: Full pardon, January 20, 2025 DOJ case page: https://www.justice.gov/usao-dc/defendants/dempsey-david Search terms people use to find this page: David Dempsey January 6, David Dempsey pardon, Van Nuys January 6 defendant, longest January 6 sentence pardoned, J6 pardon California. This profile is unclaimed. If this is you - or your family - claiming it is free, forever.