Jan. 6 Case Pulls Conservative Supreme Court in Two Directions

The US Supreme Court gets its first look at the legal implications of Jan. 6 in a case that pits cross-ideological concerns over expansive prosecutorial discretion against the conservative justices’ fidelity to the words of a statute.

At issue in the case set for argument April 16 is whether the Justice Department went too far in charging some Capitol riot defendants with an Enron-era statute aimed at curbing evidence destruction, which carries a hefty 20-year maximum sentence.

Those urging the justices to rein in prosecutorial power say the Justice Department dusted off an ill-fitting statute in order to concoct charges ...