Thread by @JordanOnRecord

Finally for the day we have a hearing for white supremacist Timothy Hale-Cusanelli. The government would like to postpone his trial while they continue gathering evidence. He opposes that. It's scheduled at the moment to begin on 11/9. wusa9.com/article/news/n… #CapitolRiot @wusa9

Timothy Hale-Cusanelli's hearing is before U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden. wusa9.com/article/news/n…

Judge McFadden is talking about all of the ongoing COVID-9 issues and restrictions with holding jury trials. Says the D.C. District Court is currently only picking juries on Mondays and Wednesdays right now.

Emily Miller, deputy chief at the U.S. Attorney's Office for D.C., is providing an update on discovery in the case. Miller is overseeing the discovery process in the Capitol riot cases (which currently amounts to thousands of hours of footage, tens of thousands of documents).

Miller says as of last night, the DOJ has given defense attorneys access to more than 4 terabytes of body-worn camera footage from D.C. Police. Roughly 15,000 files.

What remains to be disclosed? Footage from inside the Capitol (Hale-Cusanelli is alleged to have entered), even more body-worn camera footage, thousands of other documents.

.@joshgerstein and @kyledcheney did a good story for Politico in July looking at the unprecedented levels of discovery in the #CapitolRiot case and the unusual steps the DOJ is taking to make it available to defense attorneys. politico.com/news/2021/07/0…

Emily Miller says defense attorneys should have access to the Relativity database Deloitte is building for the DOJ this month.

Miller says defense attorneys should now have all of the reports documenting internal investigations into @CapitolPolice officers' actions on January 6, as well as 42 reports looking at @DCPoliceDept officers. Says these have been "high interest" for the defense.

Emily Miller: "We are not saying this will never end. We are just asking for a reasonable opportunity to provide the materials that are relevant to this defendant." #CapitolRiot @wusa9 @EricFlackTV

Miller says next week they expect to get 60+ police after-action reports from officers who responded to the January 6 #CapitolRiot. (We'll also be asking for these, naturally.) @wusa9 @EricFlackTV

The point of all of this is that the DOJ wants to both:

1. Push back the trial date, and;
2. Keep Timothy Hale-Cusanelli in pretrial detention.

Emily Miller says pretrial detention has gone on for longer for federal defendants involving far less serious charges.

Emily Miller also says Hale-Cusanelli's request for a speedy trial is "disingenuous." Says she thinks he's actually maneuvering for a dismissal. Notes he hasn't filed a number of required items.

The phrase "voluminous discovery" is going to provoke a Pavlovian response in me by the time these cases are done.

Timothy Hale-Cusanelli's attorney, Jonathan Crisp, says he's happy to argue against some of the DOJ's points, but says he got the impression from Judge McFadden's earlier statements that the trial getting pushed back is already a fait accompli.

Crisp says there are other Capitol riot defendants accused of violence who have been released (Federico Klein, for example), whereas the DOJ is relying on "10-to-12-year-old incidents" to detain Hale-Cusanelli.

Crisp: "We already have evidence he was in the building. Do we need another 27 videos? I'm not sure we do."

Crisp: "We are willing to go forward with the evidence that exists at this time, judge."

Judge McFadden is granting the DOJ's request to push back Timothy Hale-Cusanelli's trial.

The judge said "voluminous discovery." Everybody drink.

McFadden says Hale-Cusanelli is looking at "mid-to-late Spring" for a trial now, which does potentially put him into a presumptively prejudicial delay of more than a year. However, he says that's justified because:

1. Amount of discovery is unprecedented;
2. COVID-19.

Judge McFadden says it's possible the January 6 trials could need a special jury panel with even more people, which is, for me at least, the first time I'm hearing this.

McFadden says he's not one to grant trial continuances "repeatedly or lightly." Says it will be "a very different analysis" come spring if the government tries to ask for another one.

Hale-Cusanelli's attorney is objecting to any further delays beyond April. Says he has a trial in April but will move it. Also says government attorneys are "fungible," which is not true – you're all very special to me.

Hale-Cusanelli's new trial date is May 23. Pretrial conference set for May 6.