Did Tampa FARA Trial Just Crash And Burn?
There has been a very interesting development in the Uhuru Three trial in Tampa—that’s the Middle District of Florida. I picked this up listening to Scott Ritter and Judge Nap and did some searches. The trial arose following the 2017 mayoral election in Tampa. The Uhuru Three defendants are Pan Africanists who supported the unsuccessful African People's Socialist Party candidacy of Jesse Nevel. This is the only article that seemed relevant from the search results.
The title actually illustrates a frequent misunderstanding—the idea that the FBI “prosecutes” people. They don’t. The DoJ does, typically through local US Attorney Offices located in every federal judicial district. As you’ll see, it wasn’t the FBI investigator who was exposed. Rather, the FBI investigator threw the prosecutor(s)—Assistant US Attorney(s)—under the bus. It was the prosecutors who were exposed. Rather than being “forced … to admit” anything, it appears the FBI investigator volunteered the damning information. Maybe the whole context looks a bit different, but this is what I have. Read it—and note that the FBI investigator’s responses are absolutely unequivocal and place the blame for the false indictment squarely on the prosecutors:
Defense cross-examines the FBI’s lead investigator
Uhuru 3 attorneys forced the lead investigator, and FBI’s star witness, to admit that there was no evidence to prove accusations made in the DOJ’s indictment. They exposed as lies the DOJ statements that there was Russian interference in the mayoral campaign of Jesse Nevel.
Uhuru 3 attorney: “Do you have any evidence of Russian interference in the 2017 St. Petersburg, Florida mayoral campaign of Jesse Nevel?” FBI: “No”
Uhuru 3 attorney: “Why was that accusation included in the indictment?” FBI: “I didn’t write the indictment.”
Uhuru 3 attorney: “When you were in discussions with the DOJ about the indictments, you were aware that there was no evidence of Russian interference in Jesse Nevel’s electoral campaign?” FBI: “Yes.”
Uhuru 3 attorney: “So a press release was issued saying that the Russian government was interfering in U.S elections through Jesse Nevel’s campaign while you knew there was absolutely no evidence of that.” FBI: “Yes.”
The government claimed that the Uhuru Movement’s petition charging the U.S. government with genocide was a Russian invention. Uhuru 3 Attorney Leonard Goodman asked the witness if she was aware of the “We Charge Genocide” petition, submitted by black leaders to the U.N. in 1951. She was not.
If that was the testimony, it’s hard to see a conviction resulting.
So what happened, what’s the real story? Obviously someone in DoJ decided they wanted a FARA Russia Hoax case. I hope I’m not destroying anyone’s illusions, but political prosecutions do occur—more often than not under suggestions from on high, Main Justice, rather than instigated at the local level. The FBI investigator does admit that she was aware of the false charges in the indictment—which was written (as is always the case) by the prosecutors. She appears to acknowledge having discussed the charges contained in the indictment with the prosecutors. The prosecutors may have a different story, perhaps they’ll even claim that the FBI misled them. Why did she go along with the sham up to the point of testifying at trial? That would be anyone’s guess. There would have been plenty of time for her to have told the prosecutors: No. One way or another, I wouldn’t want to be in the shoes of any of the government players—right up to the US Attorney and the FBI SAC. I would expect the judge to exhibit no sense of humor about this. If what the FBI investigator says is true, this is criminal misconduct.
Now, Ritter mentions one aspect of this investigation that could land the FBI agent(s) in trouble. Apparently a search warrant issued in this case—at least, that’s what Ritter says. Affidavits in support of search warrants are supposed to be the product of the FBI investigation. As written, they are the statement of FBI investigators and are signed by the FBI investigator. In practice, they are often written by the prosecutors (I was an exception in writing my own affidavits), but the FBI agents sign the affidavits, thus making the statements their own. The statements in the affidavits are not necessarily identical with the charges in the later indictment—for obvious reasons. A search takes place when the case is still in the investigative phase, whereas the indictment incorporates the results of the whole investigation, including those that may have flowed from the search. Nevertheless, there is often overlap between affidavits for warrants and later indictments—again for obvious reasons. Any investigation into the whole matter will be looking at this aspect, as well.
I do remember hearing about this case some time ago, and it sounded like complete BS at the time. The prosecutive theory appears to have been that, since the Uhuru movement may have been influenced by the then USSR back in 1951, the current defendants are Russian agents—a sort of Russia Hoax original sin passed on to the ideological descendants of the 1951 Uhuru movement. That’s my speculation, since the FBI agent claims to have been unaware of that 1951 submission to the UN. Anyway. Ritter naturally hopes that this exposure of DoJ criminal misconduct will benefit him in his legal situation. It certainly should lend support to defense arguments that the current fashion of government prosecutions for speech related offenses are an invitation to ideologically motivated witchhunts and even criminal misconduct on the part of prosecutors and should be subjected to very strict judicial scrutiny.
Main DoJ appears to be heavily politicized as manifest in Merrick Garland's recent actions in regard to quelling free speech related to the potential for voting irregularities and election interference. My guess is that this prosecution was intended to be an easy and quick guilty verdict on FARA charges, which would then have a chilling effect on independent internet journalists and commenters that are currently criticizing government institutions. Scott Ritter comes to mind. The goal is intimidation, not justice.
In the present (and much of the past) justice in the USA often depends on who is sitting on the bench, and the outlook in this case is not good given the refusal of the judge to replace the absent juror with someone of the same ancestry from the jury pool. So the trial proceeds without a single actual peer on the jury.
"Attorney Mutaqee Akbar raised the fact that the missing juror was the only African on the jury. He asked the judge to replace her with the sole African juror in the pool of alternates who have been seated in the jury box throughout the trial.
The judge refused and seated a white juror. The 12-person jury now has no African members."
Not a good look.