Well, it’s not the kind of post-trial motion you see every day: a motion accusing a judge of helping plan an FBI raid that led to a criminal prosecution over which she presided.
But indeed, that motion was made today by lawyers for Sholom Rubashkin (pictured), the former manager of an Iowa slaughterhouse recently sentenced to 27 years in prison for bank fraud.
Click here for the BLT Blog item; here for an item from the Des Moines Register; here for the new-trial motion; here, here and herefor previous LB posts on the Rubashkin matter.
Lawyers for Rubashkin on Thursday asked for a new trial based on Iowa federal judge Linda Reade’s alleged interaction with federal investigators in the raid targeting Rubashkin and his kosher meatpacking plant.
The Rubashkin defense team’s motion is based on new documents that were produced through a Freedom of Information Act request. Rubashkin’s lawyers said Reade failed to disclose the depth of her interaction in the law enforcement planning of the raid, which led to he arrest of nearly 400 undocumented workers. Federal prosecutors brought immigration-related charges against Rubashkin. Those charges, however, were later dropped after a jury convicted Rubashkin on bank-fraud charges at the end of 2009.
The documents, according to the defense lawyers, show that Reade began meeting with the U.S. Attorney’s office in October 2007. According to the filing, she said in January 2008 she was “willing to support the operation in any way possible.”
Judge Reade was not immediately reached by the Des Moines Register.
Bob Teig, a spokesman for the U.S. attorney’s office, told the Register that prosecutors had seen the filing and would respond in court papers.
“The only thing I would note is, any reference to (Rubashkin’s) guilt or innocence is noticeably missing,” Teig said to the Register.
