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By Matthew Russell Lee

FEDERAL COURTHOUSE, July 25 – Dayvon Chestnut took the bus from rural South Carolina to New York City to sell guns.

 After he pled guilty before US District Court for the Southern District of New York Judge William H. Pauley III, his defense lawyer wrote in his sentencing submission that Chestnut "sold guns to make money, but he also believed that evading gun regulations was not necessarily a bad thing... He felt strongly about gun ownership, disagreed with gun regulations, and believed that strict gun laws were antithetical to the Constitution and to the American way of life."

  Chestnut's own letter, or e-mail, to Judge Pauley says that "I accolade the high school students who took the time to protest gun violence." During his sentencing proceeding on July 25, with Inner City Press the only media in the courtroom, Chestnut cried out when his business failed - it involved flea markets - he felt a need to make money, he didn't yet recognize the harm that guns could do.

 One of his guns was used in a shooting in Brooklyn, another to pistol-whip a victim in Queens. Judge Pauley said no one in this courtroom can yet know what the other guns Chestnut brought will do.

 Still, Judge Pauley noted that Chestnut was the captain of his high school's golf team and in the ROTC. He sentenced his to two years in jail, recommended in South Carolina, and supervised release thereafter with the search condition. He urged Chestnut not to appear about in court, not only in the SDNY but also down in South Carolina. He wished him well, as do we. The case is USA v. Chestnut, 18-cr-00612 (Pauley).

  Back on July 17 hours after ordering the release of the Michael Cohen search warrant materials,  Judge Pauley conducted a sentencing proceeding for Jamel Johnson for drug dealing and possession and use of a firearm in the Edenwald Houses in The Bronx. Judge Pauley who recently presided over the graphic trial of James Felton for murder in The Bronx was admonishing Jamel Johnson to try to do better upon his release for his family. Right then Johnson was turned back toward his family in the gallery where Inner City Press was the only media. Johnson was gesticulating, in a way that connoted disinterest at least in the eight year sentence being imposed.

  Judge Pauley said, "You look at me when I'm imposing sentence. Show some respect for the Court or I'll change the sentence right now."

  Johnson nodded. Children continued to make the noise they make, not their fault; no one took them out of the courtroom. At the end the Marshals following the rules did not allow any physical contact. Eight years is a long time. We will continue to follow this, the Felton and associated Bronx cases including, it seems, a confidential sentencing by Judge Preska, and all other SDNY cases.

   Two months after Michael Cohen received a three year sentence in the SDNY, on February 7 Judge Pauley issued an order on how much information gathered during the investigation should be made public.

Now on July 17, Judge Pauley has denied the government's attempt to withhold, and ordered that it be filed on the public docket on July 18 at 11 am - an hour and a half after fellow SDNY Judge Richard M. Berman is set to issue his Jeffrey Epstein bond decision three stories below. From Judge Pauley's July 17 order: " On July 15, 2019, the Government submitted a status report and proposed redactions to the Materials ex parte and under seal. The Government now represents that it has concluded the aspects of its investigation that justified the continued sealing of the portions of the Materials relating to Cohen’s campaign finance violations. Although the Government agrees that the majority of the campaign finance portions of the Materials may be unsealed, it requests limited redactions to those portions to protect third-party privacy interests.  After reviewing the Government’s status report and proposed redactions, this Court denies the Government’s request. In particular—and in contrast to the private nature of Cohen’s business transactions—the weighty public ramifications of the conduct described in the campaign finance portions warrant disclosure. See United States v. Amodeo, 71 F.3d 1044, 1051 (2d Cir. 1995) (explaining that “financial records of a wholly owned business, family affairs, illnesses, embarrassing conduct with no public ramifications, and similar matters will weigh more heavily against access than conduct affecting a substantial portion of the public”). Moreover, the involvement of most of the relevant third-party actors is now public knowledge, undercutting the need for continued secrecy. See United States v. Basciano, 2010 WL 1685810, at *4 (E.D.N.Y. Apr. 23, 2010) (“Shielding third parties from unwanted attention arising from an issue that is already public knowledge is not a sufficiently compelling reason to justify withholding judicial documents from public scrutiny.”). On balance, the “strong presumption of public access” to search warrants and search warrant materials under the common law far outweighs the weakened privacy interests at play here. See Cohen, 366 F. Supp. 3d at 621-22 (collecting cases).  3  The campaign finance violations discussed in the Materials are a matter of national importance. Now that the Government’s investigation into those violations has concluded, it is time that every American has an opportunity to scrutinize the Materials. Indeed, the common law right of access—a right so enshrined in our identity that it “predate[s] even the Constitution itself”—derives from the public’s right to “learn of, monitor, and respond to the actions of their representatives and representative institutions.” United States v. Erie Cty., 763 F.3d 235, 238-39 (2d Cir. 2014).  Accordingly, the Government is directed to file the July 15, 2019 status report and the Materials on the public docket on July 18, 2019 at 11:00 a.m." Watch this site.

On February 20, Judge Pauley has granted an order pushing back Cohen's date of surrender to prison from March 6 to May 6, on the basis of a "more fulsome letter" submitted by his lawyers on February 12 - under seal.

  While much of the interest is in Cohen and, behind him, President Donald Trump, Pauley's order addresses the need for public oversight of Federal authorities including judges. From the SDNY decision in U.S. v. Cohen, 18-cr-00602: "the presumption of access is at its core tethered to the need for public monitoring of the federal courts and their exercise of judicial power. Cf. SEC v. Van Waeyenberghe, 990 F.2d 845, 847 (5th Cir. 1993) (explaining that “[t]he public’s right to information does not protect the same interests that the right of access is designed to protect”). As the Second Circuit explained, Monitoring both provides judges with critical views of their work and deters arbitrary judicial behavior. Without monitoring, moreover, the public could have no confidence in the conscientiousness, reasonableness, or honesty of judicial proceedings. Such monitoring is not possible without access to testimony and documents that are used in the performance of Article III functions. Amodeo II, 71 F.3d at 1050." While a fine basis, this would militate not only for the release of search warrant records but more transparency and accessibilty day to day in the courts, something lacking even the day before in the presentment of Afghan national Haji Abdul Sattar Barakzai a/k/a Manaf for allegedly supporting the Taliban with heroin imports and sales, click here for that.

   Judge Pauley's February 7 order provides, "The Government is directed to submit a sealed, ex parte copy of the Materials by February 28, 2019 with proposed redactions in highlights consistent with this Opinion & Order. After reviewing the proposed redactions, this Court will direct the Government to file the redacted Materials on the public docket in this action."

   Previously from outside the Court in the Cohen case on December 12 surrounded by a sea of cameras and tripods, Inner City Press live-streamed: see Periscope broadcasts here and here. A week before that in Courtroom 12A there was a guilty verdict in the UN bribery trial...

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