Posted on 06/12/2024 2:28:46 PM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum
DETROIT (AP) — An appeals court is raising major questions about the trial of two key figures in a plot to kidnap Michigan’s governor — and putting federal prosecutors on the defensive as the government tries to preserve the extraordinary guilty verdicts.
After hearing arguments in May, the court took the uncommon step of asking for more written briefs on the impact of a trial judge’s decision to bar evidence that might have supported claims of entrapment made by Adam Fox and Barry Croft Jr.
Fox and Croft are in prison for leading a conspiracy to try to snatch Gov. Gretchen Whitmer in 2020. Prosecutors said a ragtag band of anti-government extremists had hoped that an abduction at her vacation home would spark a civil war around the same time as the presidential election.
Defense attorneys wanted jurors to see more communications between FBI handlers, undercover agents and paid informants who had fooled Fox and Croft and got inside the group. They argued that any plan to kidnap Whitmer was repeatedly pushed by those government actors.
But at the 2022 trial, U.S. District Judge Robert Jonker greatly restricted the use of certain text messages and audio recordings under his interpretation of evidence rules.
“Trials are about telling your story, giving your narrative, trying to persuade,” Croft’s appellate lawyer, Timothy Sweeney, told the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which posts audio on its website.
“When you’re denied the ability to use the rules of evidence where they benefit you, that is an unfair trial. ... This case needs to be reversed and sent back for a new trial for that reason,” Sweeney said.
He might have Judge Joan Larsen on his side. She was the most aggressive on the three-judge panel, at one point seeming incredulous with the government’s stance on an...
(Excerpt) Read more at apnews.com ...
The infestation of our government by human termites is absolutely disgusting, to me.
SIMILAR EVENTS AT TRUMP NYC “TRIAL”.
Stretchin Gretchen is an evil fascist witch.
Governor Shinyface apparently didn't learn a whole lot about the English language when she was sleeping her way through the males of her college class.
"retch" is where the mind IMMEDIATELY goes.
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