Still not sure who had standing to ask for a re-hearing; both parties to the case were in agreement.
The case transmogrified from US v. Flynnn to Sullivan v. Flynn.
I don’t mean that in a flippant way. It’s a reasonable literal view. Sullivan has been indicating interest in use of a court’s inherent criminal contempt power, in light of a motion to withdraw guilty plea. The argument is that the guilty plea is itself perjurous (he does not plan to charge taht, he can’t), and had it been a not guilty plea, Flynn would have been showing properdeference to the court.
Criminal contempt is an inherent power of the court. But to apply to withdraw of guilty plea is unprecedented, especially in light of government admission there is no case and so on.
The government isn’t a party, no matter what. This is court vs. defendant. The government’s stake in this is government power to withdraw a charge. as far as the court is concerned, it HAS allowed the charge to be withdrawn. What Sullivan is not releasing is the defendant, and he is doing so by abuse of judicial power.
Judge Sullivan was made a respondent to the mandamus petition by Flynn.
He requested the en banc review.
No one had standing. The judge has done something that no judge has ever done before. I am shocked that the court agreed to hear his case.