PHOENIX (AP) – A judge on Wednesday ordered prison officials to supply organic food to an Arizona man accused of participating in the US Capitol insurrection while wearing face paint, shirtless and a furry hat with horns.
The order came after a lawyer for defendant Jacob Chansley complained that his client had gone nine days without eating because organic food is not served in the Washington prison where he is staying.
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Chansley has lost 20 pounds since he moved from Arizona to Washington last week, said his lawyer, Albert Watkins. Chansley, who calls himself “QAnon Shaman”, considers eating organic food as part of his “shamanic belief system and way of life,” said the lawyer.
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Three weeks ago, when he was arrested in Arizona on charges of the January 6 riot, Chansley spent days without food because the detention center there did not offer organic food. The US Marshals Service in Arizona said it “has reached an appropriate course of action in relation to Jacob Chansley’s dietary needs”, but declined to say whether he had received organic food.
When asking for organic food behind bars, Chansley argued about religious freedom and said he had been following this diet for eight years while practicing shamanism.
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In an order issued late on Wednesday, US District Judge Royce Lamberth said prison officials had made religious dietary exemptions for inmates who are Muslim and Jewish and were unable to cite an instance in which they denied such a request based on in the perception of lack of religious merit.
Lamberth said that Chansley’s diet was based on his religious beliefs and that his willingness to spend more than a week without eating is strong evidence of the sincerity of these beliefs.
Prosecutors said Chansley entered the Capitol carrying a US flag attached to a wooden mast with a spear at the top, ignored an official’s orders to leave, went to the Senate House and wrote a threatening note to then Vice President Mike Pence.
Chansley told investigators that he went to the Capitol “at the president’s request that all ‘patriots’ go to DC on January 6,” according to court records.
Chansley’s offer for organic food is not the first unusual request made by the people accused of the riot.
Attorneys for Jenny Cudd, a florist and former mayoral candidate for the city of Midland, Texas, asked a judge for permission to take a four-day trip to Mexico’s Caribbean coast for a “work-related bond retreat” with her colleagues and their spouses. They said the trip was prepaid and planned before the Capitol riot.
Cudd’s pre-trial services officer did not object to the trip and prosecutors did not take a position on it, lawyer Farheena Siddiqui wrote in the lawsuit. The judge has yet to rule on his request. His lawyers did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Wednesday. __ Associated Press writer Jake Bleiberg in Dallas contributed to this story.