WASHINGTON ― Donald Trump’s efforts to use his presidential campaign as an excuse to attack witnesses got a stern rebuke Monday from the federal judge presiding over the criminal case over his attempted coup: not in my courtroom.

“No other criminal defendant would be allowed to do so, and I’m not going to allow it in this case,” U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan said as she imposed an order prohibiting the former president from attacking prosecution staff, court staff and witnesses associated with the four-count felony indictment.

If Trump violates her order, she would “consider sanctions as may be necessary,” the judge told prosecutors and defense lawyers in her fourth-floor courtroom.

As the war between Hamas and Israel unfolded in recent days, a Plainfield man became increasingly concerned about what he was hearing on conservative talk radio — and became agitated about the tenants living in his home, a Palestinian American mother and her young son, prosecutors said.

On Saturday, he allegedly attacked her and then stabbed her 6-year-old son to death — horrific allegations that have stunned the Muslim community in Chicago and beyond and drawn condemnation from around the world, including from President Joe Biden.

Joseph Czuba, 71, appeared in Will County court Monday morning in a red jumpsuit and with matted hair, two days after the attack on Hanan Shaheen, 32, and her son, Wadea Al-Fayoume.

Judge Donald W. DeWilkins ordered Czuba held in jail while he faces three counts of first-degree murder, one count of attempted murder, two counts of aggravated battery and two counts of committing a hate crime. Czuba’s next court hearing is Oct. 30.

He was also worried about the “national day of jihad” on Oct. 13, and even though nothing happened then, he told his wife that he believed something would happen the next day, without specifying what, Fitzgerald said.

CDFingers wrote: Tue Oct 17, 2023 9:29 am Another incident of stochastic terrorism precipitated by right wing hate speech.

As the war between Hamas and Israel unfolded in recent days, a Plainfield man became increasingly concerned about what he was hearing on conservative talk radio — and became agitated about the tenants living in his home, a Palestinian American mother and her young son, prosecutors said.

On Saturday, he allegedly attacked her and then stabbed her 6-year-old son to death — horrific allegations that have stunned the Muslim community in Chicago and beyond and drawn condemnation from around the world, including from President Joe Biden.

Joseph Czuba, 71, appeared in Will County court Monday morning in a red jumpsuit and with matted hair, two days after the attack on Hanan Shaheen, 32, and her son, Wadea Al-Fayoume.

Judge Donald W. DeWilkins ordered Czuba held in jail while he faces three counts of first-degree murder, one count of attempted murder, two counts of aggravated battery and two counts of committing a hate crime. Czuba’s next court hearing is Oct. 30.

https://chicago.suntimes.com/crime/2023 ... hate-crime

If the media called it what it is, stochastic terrorism, and tied it properly to the orange spirochete, we might be able to rein it in some. But no. That would reduce the media opportunities to exploit these incidents for clicks and kopeks.

CDFingers

Joseph Czuba, the 71-year-old U.S. Air Force veteran accused of killing 6-year-old Wadea Al-Fayoume by stabbing him 26 times, and stabbing his mother repeatedly in their suburban Chicago home on Saturday, was arraigned at the Will County, Illinois, Courthouse in Joliet. He is charged with first-degree murder, first-degree attempted murder, aggravated battery with a deadly weapon, and two counts of committing a hate crime.

Ahmed Rehab, president of the Council on American-Islamic Relations in Chicago, said during a news conference Sunday that the boy's father told him that Czuba had no problems with the family until Hamas militants carried out its surprise attack on Israel on Oct. 7, storming across the border from Gaza and indiscriminately killing men, women and children. He said the father informed him that Czuba even once built a treehouse for the boy and gave him toys. "This atmosphere has created a monster out of a normal man who once built a treehouse," Rehab said.

U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland has instructed the Chicago FBI Field Office, the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice, and the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of Illinois to open a federal hate crimes investigation into the killing. "This incident cannot help but further raise the fears of Muslim, Arab, and Palestinian communities in our country with regard to hate-fueled violence," Garland said in a statement. "The Department of Justice is focused on protecting the safety and the civil rights of every person in this country."

Ari Hart and four fellow rabbis from Chicago-area congregations went to the The Mosque Foundation in Bridgeview, Illinois, for the funeral of Wadea Al-Fayoume.

Recognizing the sensitivity of the situation, Hart contacted local Muslim leaders before attending the boy's service, which was attended by hundreds of mourners. He asked if their presence could be "meaningful," and received a positive response. Mourners gather outside the funeral of Wadea Al-Fayoume, a 6-year-old who was stabbed to death in a Chicago suburb. The suspect has been charged with a hate crime, "I give them a lot of credit, because it's not easy," Hart said, a self-described Orthodox Jew and Zionist. "These are our neighbors, and we have very different views about the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians."

Ahmed Rehab, executive director of the Chicago chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, didn't hesitate when Hart reached out. "I told them we would treat them with respect. They are guests, and we can hash out our political differences another day," Rehab said.

Although I often wish that Donald Trump would shut up, he has a constitutional right not to. A federal judge went too far in restricting his free expression Monday when she imposed a gag order on the former president. U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan, who is presiding over the Washington prosecution of Trump for his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection, ordered him to refrain from rhetoric targeting prosecutors and court personnel as well as inflammatory statements about likely witnesses. Chutkan issued the order in response to a motion from special counsel Jack Smith. Trump has said on social media that Smith is “deranged,” that the judge is “a radical Obama hack” and that the court system is “rigged.” He has also attacked potential witnesses such as former Vice President Mike Pence.

I certainly understand Chutkan’s desire to limit such speech, and this is obviously a unique case with no similar precedents. But basic 1st Amendment principles cast serious doubt on the judge’s order.

The Supreme Court has long held that court orders prohibiting speech constitute “prior restraint” and are allowed only in extraordinary and compelling circumstances. In New York Times Co. vs. United States (1971), for example, the justices held that the courts could not constitutionally enjoin newspapers from publishing the Pentagon Papers, a history of America’s involvement in the Vietnam War. The Supreme Court held that there is a strong presumption against orders preventing speech. Even more to the point, in Nebraska Press Assn. vs. Stuart (1976), the justices held that the courts can almost never keep the press from reporting on criminal cases, even when the goal is to protect a defendant’s right to a fair trial. Although the Supreme Court hasn’t considered gag orders on parties to a case and their lawyers, the same strong presumption should apply against such prior restraints.

What is particularly troubling about Chutkan’s order is that it seems primarily concerned with protecting prosecutors and court personnel from Trump’s vitriol. The law is clear that speech can’t be restricted to prevent government officials from being criticized or even vilified. The Supreme Court has repeatedly held that the 1st Amendment protects a right to criticize government officials, even harshly. In New York Times Co. vs. Sullivan (1964), the court unanimously declared that the amendment reflects a “profound national commitment to the principle that debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust, and wide-open, and that it may well include vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks on government and public officials.”

Ultimately, the judge imposed a gag order on Trump because his speech is often unpleasant and offensive. But that is simply not a basis for restricting speech under the 1st Amendment. We may loathe what Trump says, but we must defend his right to say it.

Under federal law, inciting a riot (18 U.S. Code Section 2101) includes acts of "organizing, promoting, encouraging, participating in a riot" and urging or instigating others to riot. The criminal code clarifies that incitement is not the same as simply advocating ideas or expressing beliefs in speech or writing. In order to qualify as incitement, the speech must advocate violence, the rightness of violence, or the right to commit violent acts.

sikacz wrote: Thu Oct 19, 2023 9:30 am Having rights means people will use them in ways we may not appreciate. Still there are laws against somethings as noted.

Sidney Powell Pleads Guilty In Deal Over Efforts To Overturn Trump Loss In Georgia

ATLANTA (AP) — Lawyer Sidney Powell pleaded guilty to reduced charges Thursday over efforts to overturn Donald Trump’s loss in the 2020 election in Georgia, becoming the second defendant in the sprawling case to reach a deal with prosecutors.

Powell, who was charged alongside Trump and 17 others with violating the state’s anti-racketeering law, entered the plea just a day before jury selection was set to start in her trial. She pleaded guilty to six misdemeanors related to intentionally interfering with the performance of election duties.

As part of the deal, she will serve six years of probation, will be fined $6,000 and will have to write an apology letter to Georgia and its residents. She also agreed to testify truthfully against her co-defendants at future trials.

Powell, 68, was initially charged with racketeering and six other counts as part of a wide-ranging scheme to keep the Republican president in power after he lost the 2020 election to Democrat Joe Biden. Prosecutors say she also participated in an unauthorized breach of elections equipment in a rural Georgia county elections office.

Judge shoots down Trump effort to halt lawsuit trying to disqualify him from ballot

Some of Donald Trump's critics — including conservative legal figures — have been arguing that his efforts to overturn the 2020 election results were not only illegal, but also, disqualify him from running for president in 2024 under the insurrection clause in the U.S. Constitution's 14th Amendment.

Trump's allies were hoping that a lawsuit trying to keep him off the 2024 ballot would be thrown out in court, but in Colorado, Judge Sarah Wallace has ruled that the lawsuit can go forward.

Law & Crime's Matt Naham reports that Wallace "sided with a group of voters represented by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) who, citing January 6, sued in September to 'challenge the listing of Respondent Donald J. Trump as a candidate on the 2024 Republican presidential primary election ballot and any future election ballot, based on his disqualification from public office under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.'"

Trump's lawyers, Naham notes, tried to make an "anti-SLAPP" argument against the lawsuit, but Wallace disagreed. SLAPP stands for "strategic lawsuit against participation."

Wallace noted that anti-SLAPP laws "are intended to enable courts to dismiss frivolous cases brought with the intent to chill a person's constitutional rights."

According to Naham, "After concluding that the anti-SLAPP statute Trump cited did not apply to the case, the judge said that a scheduled October 13 anti-SLAPP hearing has been changed to a status conference, as the case speeds toward a trial on the merits on October 30."

cooper wrote: Thu Oct 19, 2023 2:03 pm Wait. She also has to testify. Well, that's something. We'll see.

Bisbee wrote: Thu Oct 19, 2023 4:47 pm Turning state witness is what got her a slap on the wrist deal. If Sydney fails to sing like a robin, she could still become a jail-bird. I like having someone deep in the thick of TOS Crazyland turning states evidence. She’s worth the plea deal IMHO.

Michigan Republican Charged In Fake Elector Plot Agrees To Cooperation Deal

LANSING, Mich. (AP) — A Michigan Republican accused of participating in a fake elector plot had all criminal charges dropped Thursday after he and the state Attorney General’s office reached a cooperation deal.

James Renner was one of 16 Republicans who acted as false electors for then-President Donald Trump in 2020, according to charges announced in July by Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel.

But on Thursday, the attorney general’s office announced during a court hearing in Ingham County that it would drop its case against Renner, 77, based on “an agreement between the parties.”

Renner’s lawyer, Clint Westbrook, said in court that he and his client welcomed the result. Westbrook did not immediately return a phone call seeking further comment on the agreement.

In a statement, the state Attorney General’s office said they dismissed the Renner case under a cooperation agreement. While the office did not elaborate further, cooperation agreements typically include talking to investigators and, if necessary, testifying against others.

Jack Smith drops hammer on Trump in new filing: 'Defendant is not above the law'

Donald Trump is "not above the law," according to a new filing by special counsel Jack Smith in which the prosecutor dismantles the former president's argument that he is absolutely immune from prosecution due to his former office.

Trump asked the D.C. court to dismiss the criminal counts against him for alleged election subversion in the case before Judge Tanya Chutkan, arguing that he has presidential immunity. That motion was compared by one former prosecutor to a bid to turn "presidents into kings."

Now, Smith has filed his response to that effort.

In the recently publicized filing, Smith argues that Trump is trying to set himself apart from every other citizen in the entire United States.

"He is subject to the federal criminal laws like more than 330 million other Americans, including Members of Congress, federal judges, and everyday citizens," Smith wrote in the motion filed Thursday. "None of the sources the defendant points to in his motion—the Constitution’s text and structure, history and tradition, or Supreme Court precedent—supports the absolute immunity he asks the Court to create for him."

The prosecutor further notes that Trump attempts to "draw a parallel between his fraudulent efforts to overturn the results of an election that he lost and the likes of Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address and George Washington’s Farewell Address."

"These things are not alike," Smith wrote in the brief. "The more apt parallel the defendant identifies is to judges, who, like a former president, enjoy absolute immunity from civil damages liability for certain conduct but who are 'subject to criminal prosecutions as are other citizens.' The same is true for the defendant."

Smith concludes by calling on the judge to completely reject Trump's motion for immunity.