As finger-pointing among Philadelphia prosecutors now moves into a federal criminal investigation, anxiety may be growing for prosecutors who served under former Chicago state’s attorney Kimberly Foxx.
U.S. Federal Judge Paul Diamond has referred criminal investigation against Philadelphia prosecutor Larry Krasner and possibly some attorneys serving under him. In the wake of this referral, tensions are high among prosecutors, according to Big Trial journalist Ralph Cipriano.
“Over at the Philadelphia District Attorney’s office, people are on edge because any day now, they expect to either get a call from the FBI, or get served with a summons to appear before a federal grand jury,” Cipriano wrote.
Is it time for Chicago prosecutors serving under former top prosecutor Kim Foxx to start getting nervous, as well?
Let’s review.
Krasner’s potential downfall is tied to perhaps the most influential strategy of the modern Democratic Party and certainly all Goerge Soros–supported prosecutors throughout the country: the exoneration of convicted killers. Imposing prosecutors like Krasner and Foxx paints a picture of radicalized prosecutors all too willing to criminalize the police and lionize killers, gang members, and rapists.
The Krasner scandal is tied to a wrongful conviction claim involving a convicted killer, Dennis Johnson. It is this case that has landed Krasner, and perhaps others, in hot water.
“U.S. District Court Judge Paul Diamond has concluded that DA Larry Krasner and ADA Matthew Stiegler, a top aide, may have engaged in a criminal conspiracy to deceive the court,” writes Cipriano.
Normally, prosecutors enjoy absolute immunity in the course of their prosecutorial duties. But Krasner, according to Cipriano, is accused of threatening underlings.
“Judge Diamond heard testimony from four of Krasner’s top supervisors, who told the judge under oath that Krasner had threatened them with ‘consequences’ for disclosing conflicts inside the DAO,” reports Ciprinao.
Such threats, if true, would be outside the scope of a prosecutor’s absolute immunity protection, and so Judge Diamond initiated a criminal referral to the Department of Justice, perhaps the first time an exoneration scandal is landing on the desk of the feds for a criminal investigation.
Troubles may be emerging for prosecutors under Kim Foxx who were also tied to controversial exoneration cases.
The Chicago City Council recently approved a $13.5 million settlement to two illegal immigrants, Gabriel Solache and Arturo Reyes, once convicted of stabbing a couple to death and kidnapping their two children. The city council approval comes despite the fact that Foxx was deposed about the case and admitted under oath she believed the men were guilty of the crime.
The admission that Foxx believed the men were guilty was a bombshell in and of itself, posing this question: If even Foxx thinks the men are guilty, why is the city council voting to settle with the men, making them millionaires, and not trying them in federal court?
One reason may be that prosecutors, again under Foxx, initially contested a Certificate of Innocence (COI) petition by the offenders. Certificate of Innocence petitions are a bizarre Illinois statute allowing offenders to request a judge declare them innocent. Prosecutors have to contest them. If they don’t, the judge has no option but to grant them.
In the Solache/Reyes case, Foxx suddenly and inexplicably ceased to contest the COI. The sudden reversal by Foxx prosecutors placed a great burden on the attorneys defending the cops in the federal lawsuit brought by the men, as the certificate provides a legal ruling essentially declaring the men innocent, a difficult hurdle to overcome in a federal lawsuit.
Did Foxx’s sudden refusal to contest the COIs indicate a willingness by Foxx to aid the innocence case of the two men at the expense of prosecutorial integrity, much as the Krasner scandal is generating claims his office went out of its way to bolster a dubious innocence narrative on behalf of Dennis Johnson?
Well, it isn’t just Foxx admitting the men were guilty under oath yet still releasing them from prison and standing by while they obtained a COI that might have feds scratching their heads about Foxx’s conduct.
In the same deposition in which Foxx admitted Solache and Reyes are guilty, she also stated that “she did not know the details of exoneration cases or how her office investigated and determined whether to challenge certificates of innocence. . . . Those matters, Foxx said, were under the purview of the office’s number-two executive, then-First Assistant Cook County State’s Attorney Risa Lanier,” according to CWB Chicago.
Did not know?
Well, now city attorneys defending accused cops want to depose Risa Lanier, no doubt to ask Lanier if Foxx’s statements are accurate.
CWB Chicago:
“The woman who served as Kim Foxx’s top assistant in the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office must sit for an under-oath deposition to explain why her office decided not to object to people convicted of murder receiving certificates of innocence even though Foxx personally believed some of the recipients were guilty.”
Is Lanier going to take responsibility or will she turn the responsibility back onto her boss, or to other prosecutors, or both?
Was it indeed your decision not to contest these COIs, Ms. Lanier? Was your decision made independently without the input of the top prosecutor?
Just as Philly prosecutors are on edge, Chicago prosecutors may be reaching for the Xanax as well, for if Foxx is passing the buck on who made such controversial decisions, who is going to take the responsibility for such ominous decisions in murder cases?
As more and more evidence of prosecutorial shenanigans emerges in exonerations by Soros-backed prosecutors, one can’t help but wonder if the feds will take a wider look at exonerations beyond just Krasner’s Philadelphia to other prosecutors throughout the country, like Foxx.
Where, prosecutors under Foxx may be asking, is that goddamn Pepto-Bismol?
I see Lanier pleading the 5th amendment a lot in the near future or an untimely death.
Great story. Keep us updated. 👊🏻