Federal prosecutors on Monday reduced the charges against a woman accused last month of assaulting an F.B.I. agent during a protest against immigration officials in Washington, refiling her case as a misdemeanor after they were unable to persuade three grand juries over a month to indict her with a felony.
It is highly unusual for prosecutors to fail even once — let alone three times — to obtain an indictment from a grand jury given the way the process is stacked in favor of the government. And the move by the prosecutors in the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington to recast the proceeding against the woman, Sidney Lori Reid, as a low-level misdemeanor case suggested that they had overcharged it from the beginning.
Prosecutors almost never go in front of grand juries without obtaining indictments because they are in control of the information grand jurors hear and defendants are not allowed to have their lawyers in the room as evidence is presented.
But in a brief submission filed to Magistrate Judge G. Michael Harvey in Federal District Court in Washington, the prosecutors in Ms. Reid’s case acknowledged the extraordinary: that they had failed three times to secure an indictment within the 30 days given to them to do so after Ms. Reid’s arrest.
“Three grand juries have now declined to indict Ms. Reid for felony assault on a law enforcement officer,” her lawyers, Tezira Abe and Eugene Ohm, said in a statement on Monday evening. “The U.S. attorney can try to concoct crimes to quiet the people, but in our criminal justice system, the citizens have the last word. We are anxious to present the misdemeanor case to a jury and to quickly clear Ms. Reid’s name.”
The reduction of the charges came as President Trump has flooded the streets of Washington with agents from several federal law enforcement agencies and with National Guard soldiers in a purported effort to drive down local crime. The measure has resulted in a flurry of defendants being charged with federal crimes that would typically be handled at the local court level, if they were filed at all.
Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.
Thank you for your patience while we verify access.
Already a subscriber? Log in.
Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
The post Prosecutors Fail 3 Times to Charge Woman With Felony Assault of F.B.I. Agent in D.C. appeared first on New York Times.
