Public January 6 profile · ready to claim

Justin LaGesse

Pardoned January 6 defendant

Archive card · not a photograph

**Justin LaGesse** is a McLeansboro man out of Hamilton County, Illinois — deep southern Illinois farm country, a county seat of about 2,700 people where everybody''s families have known each other for generations. **His story.** LaGesse was 37 when the FBI arrested him in January 2024 — three full years after January 6, 2021. He was not on the run for those three years. He was living in Hamilton County under his own name, in a county so small there is nowhere to hide (FACT — WRUL-FM, WSIL-TV and Chicago Sun-Times coverage of the McLeansboro arrests). The count against him was destruction of government property: a Capitol window struck with a flagpole. Property. Not a person. The federal record on Justin LaGesse contains no allegation that he assaulted anyone, no firearm, no knife, and nobody hurt. What he yelled at officers was ugly and he does not appear to have disputed it. He pleaded guilty in August 2024 to the felony rather than putting the government to a trial, and he agreed to pay the full repair bill — $43,315 in restitution to the Architect of the Capitol (FACT — Chicago Sun-Times, morelaw.com case record). That is a working man from a town of 2,700 signing his name to a forty-three-thousand-dollar debt to make it right. Plenty of defendants across the country fight restitution. He took it. **Where the fight stands.** LaGesse was sentenced in January 2025 by Judge James E. Boasberg to 11 months and the $43,315 restitution — sentenced within days of the change in administration. The presidential clemency proclamation of January 20, 2025 covered January 6 convictions, and the J6 pardon closed out the federal case. Justin LaGesse is home in southern Illinois. **Case record.** United States District Court for the District of Columbia. Arrested January 2024 by the FBI in Hamilton County, Illinois. Pleaded guilty August 2024 to destruction of government property (felony). Sentenced January 10, 2025 by Judge James E. Boasberg to 11 months incarceration and $43,315.25 restitution. (NEEDS AUTHENTICATION: docket number should be added from the D.D.C. record.) Search terms people use to find him: Justin LaGesse January 6, McLeansboro Illinois January 6 defendant, Hamilton County Illinois J6 pardon, pardoned January 6 southern Illinois. This profile is unclaimed. If this is you — or your family — claiming it is free, forever.