January 6 felony defendant denied request to visit pharma company’s ‘boondoggle’ in Cabo
By Dan Berman, CNN
Jason Douglas Owens, charged with assaulting a police officer at the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, wanted to go on his company’s getaway trip to Mexico next month.
A federal judge was not amused.
Last month, Owens asked for permission to attend the “2021 President’s Club” event in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, as a reward from his employer, opioid maker Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals.
The application for the 5-day retreat in June included such details as Owens’ favorite color, which is blue, and shoe size (men’s 10.5), according to court records submitted by Owens. For meals, he indicated he is “Vegan, but not too crazy strict.”
Owens made an emergency motion for permission to travel on Monday, more than a month after he asked his attorney about how to obtain permission, an email included in the court record shows. His flight from his native Texas to Mexico had already been booked.
Judge Beryl Howell, the chief judge of the Washington, DC, federal court, rejected the motion in short order Monday, calling the trip a “boondoggle.”
Howell wrote that Owens believed “this Court’s approach to nonessential foreign travel by defendants facing federal felony charges would be, like defendant’s adherence to veganism, ‘not too crazy strict.'”
Owens is charged with shoving a DC Metropolitan Police officer during the riot. His son, Grady Douglas Owens, is also charged with assaulting an officer with a skateboard. Both have pleaded not guilty.
Mallinckrodt was the subject of a recent Washington Post article, where it was called the “Kingpin” of opioid makers, Howell noted as well.
“While the Court does not begrudge defendant’s apparent business success while on pretrial release, his international travel to harvest the bounties of such success will need to wait until he is no longer facing felony charges arising from ill-advised domestic travel in January 2021,” the judge added.
Owens’ attorney did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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