Defense attorneys in the “Broadview Six” case against Operation Midway Blitz protesters want prosecutors to disclose unredacted grand jury transcripts to ferret out any potential improprieties and are asking a judge to dismiss the conspiracy count with prejudice after they say the U.S. attorney’s office has reneged on promises to do so.
The requests came in a pair of motions Monday in the politically charged case, which changed dramatically last week when prosecutors abruptly announced they were going to dismiss the main conspiracy allegations in the indictment and proceed to trial later this month on misdemeanor counts.
But the defendants have cried foul.
In one filing, attorney Christopher Parente, who represents Oak Park Trustee Brian Straw, noted the government’s decision to abandon its marquee allegations came on the same day prosecutors had been ordered to provide unredacted grand jury transcripts to U.S. District Judge April Perry.
Parente said the development came “at a time of mounting national distrust in the Department of Justice’s use of the grand jury process,” citing the recent, controversial indictments against former FBI Director James Comey and the Southern Poverty Law Center.
“These actions only underscore the growing concern that the grand jury is being wielded not as an instrument of justice, but as a tool of unchecked prosecutorial power meant to persecute any perceived enemies of the current White House,” Parente wrote.
Parente said that based on what has been turned over so far, it seemed likely the U.S. attorney’s office either misinstructed the grand jury on the law, had “improper or prejudicial” interactions with the panel, or failed to instruct the grand jury at all. Any of those scenarios, he said, would give the Department of Justice “yet another public black eye.”
“In these circumstances, there is virtually no interest in maintaining secrecy in how the government instructed a now dismissed grand jury on the law for an indictment it has already told the Court it would dismiss, but has not actually done so,” Parente wrote.
The other defense motion, filed jointly by attorneys for all four defendants, accused the U.S. attorney’s office of walking back statements in court that “we are moving to dismiss” the indictment and would be filing a superseding criminal information charging each defendant with a single misdemeanor count of impeding a law enforcement officer.
While the information was filed, the indictment has yet to be dismissed, court records show. The defense motion argued the U.S. attorney’s office has since “abruptly changed its position” and said the indictment would not be dismissed until after trial — which is their “usual” practice.
“The government’s resort to the so-called ‘usual’ practice of dismissing the indictment following the conclusion of the case belies both its statements to the Court and defense counsel as well as the fact that there is nothing ‘usual’ about the proceedings,” the defense filing stated.
U.S. Attorney Andrew Boutros has previously said his office is “constantly evaluating the facts and law in our Operation Midway Blitz cases, as well as new information when it is brought to our attention.”
“Today in court, we demonstrated that we are fully prepared to adjust our positions to adhere to that standard. Our commitment to do the right thing is unwavering in all cases,” Boutros said in a statement last week.
The defense motions were scheduled to be presented before Perry on Thursday.
In addition to Straw, the remaining defendants in the case are former congressional candidate Katherine “Kat” Abughazaleh; Andre Martin, originally of Providence, Rhode Island, who was Abughazaleh’s deputy campaign manager; and 45th Ward Democratic Committeeman Michael Rabbitt.
Earlier this year, Perry granted a request from the U.S. attorney’s office to dismiss charges against Catherine Sharp, a onetime candidate for the Cook County Board, and Joselyn Walsh, a part-time garden store worker and singer.
Prosecutors alleged the defendants were part of a group that surrounded an ICE vehicle outside the Broadview facility during a Sept. 26 protest and “banged aggressively” on the vehicle’s side and back windows, hood and doors before they “crowded together in the front and side of the Government Vehicle and pushed against the vehicle to hinder and impede its movement.”
They further alleged that the protesters scratched the vehicle’s body, broke a side mirror and a rear windshield wiper and etched the word “PIG” into the paint — though no one listed in the indictment is accused of specifically causing that damage.
The conspiracy count carried a maximum sentence of six years in federal prison, while the misdemeanor counts of impeding a federal officer are each punishable by up to one year in federal prison.
The Broadview Six case has been beset by controversy from the moment the indictment was brought last October as the defense has alleged the case was brought amid pressure from the administration of President Donald Trump and was nothing more than an attempt to silence protesters of the president’s draconian immigration policies.
