| After False 911 Complaints
US Attorney Sought Protective Order Now Defers
Prosecution
By Matthew
Russell Lee, Patreon
BBC
- Guardian
UK - Honduras
- The
Source
SDNY COURTHOUSE,
June 22 – Cortez Fowlkes is
charged with making false 911
calls claiming that people
were drowning in the Hudson
and Harlem rivers.
Then the U.S.
Attorney's Office sought a
protective order for the
discovery it would produce,
reported saying it did not
want to "see the information
on Twitter."
On August
19, U.S. District Court for
the Southern District of New
York Judge Alison Nathan held
a proceeding. Inner City Press
covered it.
Assistant U.S.
Attorney Mitzi S. Steiner told
Judge Nathan that the
discovery would show law
enforcement techniques -
nearly always the case - and
arguing that "finally, the
defendant files to articule
why public access to pre-trial
discovery is warranted in this
case."
But this reverses
the presumption of public and
press access, as this U.S.
Attorney's Office is doing or
colluding
through silence in doing more
and more.
Judge Nathan to
her credit rejected the
proposed protective order.
And now on June
22, the US Attorney's Office
filed and got approved a
Deferred Prosecution
Agreement. If Fowlkes refrains
from any law violation for six
months, the prosecution is
gone. So why did the US demand
a blanket protective order?
The case is US v.
Fowlkes, 20-cr-309 (Nathan)
***
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