National Roundup

Maryland
Trial opens for ex-top Baltimore prosecutor charged with perjury tied to property purchases
GREENBELT, Md. (AP) — A former top Baltimore prosecutor lied about her finances during the COVID-19 pandemic to improperly access retirement funds that she used to buy two homes in Florida, a federal prosecutor said Monday at the start of Marilyn Mosby’s perjury trial.

“This case is about a lawyer and a public servant who placed her own selfish interests above the truth,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Sean Delaney told jurors during the trial’s opening statements.

A defense attorney countered that Mosby — who gained a national profile for prosecuting Baltimore police officers after Freddie Gray, a Black man, died in police custody — was legally entitled to withdraw the money and spend it however she wanted. Mosby told the truth when she certified on paperwork that the pandemic harmed a travel-related business that she formed, said the lawyer, Maggie Grace.

“This case is about a three-page form and what was in Marilyn Mosby’s mind when she completed that form,” said Grace, an assistant federal public defender.

Mosby, who served two terms as state’s attorney for Baltimore, was indicted on perjury charges before a Democratic primary challenger defeated her last year.

The 2022 indictment accuses her of withdrawing $90,000 in retirement funds from her city account while falsely claiming that she had suffered financial hardships from the COVID-19 pandemic. She used the withdrawals as down payments to buy a home in Kissimmee, Florida, and a condominium in Long Boat Key, Florida.

A. Scott Bolden, a lawyer who initially represented Mosby but later withdrew from the case, has described the charges as “bogus” and claimed the case is “rooted in personal, political and racial animus.”

In 2015, her first year in office, Mosby pursued criminal charges against six police officers in Freddie Gray’s death. Gray suffered a spinal injury after police handcuffed, shackled and placed him headfirst into a van. His death led to riots and protests in the city. None of the officers was convicted.

U.S. District Judge Lydia Kay Griggsby agreed to move Mosby’s trial from Baltimore to Greenbelt, Maryland, a suburb of Washington, D.C.

Mosby’s attorneys argued that she couldn’t get a fair trial in Baltimore, where they said she has been a “lightning rod” for nearly a decade, bombarded by negative press coverage and “dogged by persistent criticism of her prosecutorial priorities.”

Prosecutors said Mosby was complaining about press coverage that she had sought and encouraged.

Mosby is charged with two counts of perjury and two counts of making false statements on a loan application.

Mosby made withdrawals of $40,000 and $50,000 from Baltimore city’s deferred compensation plan in 2020. Mosby re­ceived her full salary of approximately $250,000 that year.

Prosecutors say the money in the retirement account is held in trust and belongs to the city until a plan participant is eligible to make a withdrawal. They argue that Mosby wasn’t entitled under federal law to access the funds in 2020 because her business, Mahogany Elite Enterprises, did not suffer any “adverse financial consequences” from the pandemic.

“It had no clients. It made no revenue,” Delaney said.

Grace said prosecutors can’t prove that Mosby lied about her finances and knowingly made a false statement on the form for accessing her retirement funds.

“That is a high bar that the government cannot meet. And the government cannot meet it because Ms. Mosby’s is innocent,” she said.


Tennessee
August trial date set for officers charged in Tyre Nichols killing
MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) — A Tennessee judge on Monday set an August trial date for four former Memphis police officers charged in the fatal beating of Tyre Nichols after a traffic stop in January.

During a short hearing on Monday, Shelby County Criminal Court Judge James Jones Jr. announced the Aug. 12 trial date in the cases of Emmitt Martin, Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley and Justin Smith. Each has pleaded not guilty to second-degree murder and other charges in state court.

A fifth officer charged in the case, Desmond Mills Jr., pleaded guilty last week to federal charges of excessive force and obstruction of justice. The plea is part of a larger deal in which prosecutors said he had also agreed to plead guilty later to state charges.

Mills is the only officer to admit guilt in the criminal case. Prosecutors are recommending a 15-year prison sentence for Mills, but the final sentencing hearing rests with the federal judge.

Defense lawyers told prosecutors and the judge in private that they believe the trial could last a month, prosecutor Paul Hagerman told reporters after the hearing.

“We’re of a mind that this does not need to be a monthlong trial,” Hagerman said. “The proof is pretty simple.”

Hagerman also said it’s possible that Mills could testify at the state trial. Martin’s lawyer, William Massey, said after the hearing that he is considering filing a motion for a change of venue, which means that a jury from outside Shelby County would hear the case. Nichols’ beating death has received heavy media coverage in Memphis.

Caught on police video, the beating of Nichols in January was one in a string of violent encounters between police and Black people that sparked protests and renewed debate about police brutality and the need for police reform in the U.S. The five former officers who were charged also are Black.

Mills and four other former Memphis Police Department officers were charged in federal court with using excessive force, failing to intervene, deliberate indifference and conspiring to lie, as well as obstruction of justice after they were caught on camera punching, kicking and beating Nichols on Jan. 7. He died three days later. The federal trial date for the four other officers is May 6.

The officers said they pulled Nichols over because he was driving recklessly, but Police Chief Cerelyn “CJ’ Davis has said no evidence was found to support that allegation. Nichols ran from officers, who tried to restrain him. He pleaded for his mother as he was pummeled just steps from his home.

An autopsy report showed Nichols died from blows to the head, and that the manner of death was homicide. The report described brain injuries, cuts and bruises to the head and other parts of the body.

After Nichols’ death, all five officers were fired from the department and the crime-suppression team they were part of was disbanded.