Fewer than 10 show for rally at Brooklyn prison for NY man held for Jan. 6 assault charges

Chris McKenna, New York State Team

It was billed as a show of public outrage to demand the release of a New York man who's been jailed for 40 months while awaiting trial on charges of repeatedly assaulting cops outside the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6.

But fewer than 10 supporters turned out for the midday protest outside the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, where Sullivan County native Jake Lang is now being held. The promised spectacle of protesters riding horses in the shadow of the Gowanus Expressway wound up being a sole rider: "Cowboys for Trump" founder Couy Griffin, cradling an American flag in his saddle.

Ned Lang, father of Jake Lang, stands in front of the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn May 8, 2024 where his son his incarcerated. Jake Lang is a January 6 defendant who has been imprisoned since January 2021. Ned Lang was joined by several supporters as well as by Couy Griffin, founder of "Cowboys for Trump," who served two weeks in jail for his own part in the Capitol riot. Griffin had ridden up to the prison on horseback .

The rally, led by Lang's father, Ned Lang of Narrowsburg, was set up to protest Jake Lang's prolonged wait behind bars for his trial and the solitary confinement in which he has been held for the last month. Lang, arrested shortly after the rampage at the Capitol by Donald Trump supporters in January 2021, is among a small number of defendants — out of more than 1,400 charged with participating — who have been kept in jail while awaiting trial.

Lang protest: Rally planned at Brooklyn prison for NY man held since 2021 on Jan. 6 cop-assault charges

Lang is now scheduled to stand trial in September. His previous trial date in October 2023 was postponed at his request to await the outcome of his Supreme Court appeal to try to dismiss one of the 11 charges against him.

The 28-year-old has been held primarily in the Washington, D.C., jail but has been shuttled to other facilities and was placed in the Brooklyn prison around March 1. He told the USA Today Network in a call from the prison on Tuesday that he's been in solitary confinement since April 9 in what he claimed was punishment for his calling for a protest during a media interview.

Photographer Seth Harrison contributed to this report.

Chris McKenna covers government and politics for The Journal News and USA Today Network. Reach him at cmckenna@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on Rockland/Westchester Journal News: Capitol riot: Rally for suspect Jake Lang draws fewer than 10 people

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