Written by Wow, what a day…
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Rob Rundo, who was being held in federal custody without bail for his participation in the Rise Above Movement and several fights that broke out in 2016 and 2017, just had his case thrown out by U.S. District Judge Cormac J. Carney for selective prosecution. He is to be released from the custody of the Bureau of Prisons today.
This is a rare bright spot in our justice system, though a tenuous one. This is the same judge who dismissed the cases against the Rise Above Movement members for the application of the Riot Act being unconstitutionally overbroad. That decision was appealed by the government and overturned by the 9th Circuit. The government asked that Rundo be held pending their appeal of this decision, and Judge Carney declined their request. “I don’t believe it’s warranted that Mr. Rundo spend one minute more in custody, so I’m going to release him forthwith,” Carney said. “I feel very comfortable in the decision I’ve made.”
Carney knows that Rundo fled the jurisdiction before. The government has already filed their notice of appeal. Rundo is under no obligation to remain in the United States. It seems unlikely he’ll stay very long if he has the means to leave, but Rundo is on the “No Fly List” and I am not sure by what mechanics he was traveling prior to his arrest.
I have reached out to a mutual associate about having him on the show, and requested my Probation Officer stop obstructing my efforts to conduct that interview. Let’s hope it all works out.
I have my doubts this has a happy ending, sadly. The 9th Circuit will now be forced to rule on the question of selective prosecution. It is unlikely, in my view, that they will concede Carney’s point. This would then be on its way to the Supreme Court, assuming any of the Defendants are still in the country when that decision is overturned, or whenever those defendants were apprehended and brought to trial.
If the 9th Circuit does uphold the dismissal, or the Supreme Court does intervene, this would be a binding precedent, and that would be exceedingly good news.
In fact, I just sent this email to my attorneys from the Federal Criminal case I’m still on Probation for.
Greetings [Laywer Names],
Upon seeing an associate of mine freed from BOP custody in a years old case he was being held on pretrial, I could not help but see parallels with my own case, and even if this is not useful to me, it may be worth keeping an eye on for some of your future cases.
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24436350-judge-cormac-carney-dismisses-rundo-indictment
The case at issue is a fresh decision by a District Court Judge in California, but the government has already filed their notice of appeal. The 9th Circuit overturned this Judge’s decision the last time he dismissed this case for different reasons, and it stands to reason they may do so again. If they do not, it is my lay understand this would establish a precedent, and I would certainly hope this might be cause for me to file a new appeal, but even failing this, you may find it useful in the future.
The case was thrown out on the grounds that the government prosecuted members of the Rise Above Movement for crimes they may very well have committed, per his reasoning, but that the government knew full well the Antifa thugs had also committed, and the government chose not to prosecute them. For this selective prosecution, he dismissed the case.
I had used different wording to bring this up with Eric and Jeff, but it seemed odd to me that I could be prosecuted for extorting the guy who was harassing me and who I had repeatedly called law enforcement on. The government knew the Bowl Patrol was making my life a living hell and they sat back and enjoyed the show because they seemingly have no obligation to help people when they are disinclined to do so for whatever reason.
When that lawlessness predictably took its course, I was held liable for the outcome, and met with the jury instructions that constituted part of our appeal, in addition.
Again, whether helpful to me or not, I imagine you’ve seen your fair share of selective prosecutions over the course of your careers. I have reason to expect you’ll see them in greater proportion in the near future.
I hope this rare bright spot in our justice system helps to reduce the prevalence of that malicious practice, and if there is any justification for that hope, I am sure you are just the folks to do it.
Best Regards,
In other news, Kash Patel has teamed up with Revere Payments, marketing it as a “cancel culture proof” payment processor.
This is fake.
Some of you may recall, I went to revere payments. They refused me because my business was associated with anti-Semitism, even though the site to process the payments had nothing of the sort on it.
Calling this a “cancel culture proof” option when it explicitly cancels for speech is just more fake nonsense. Either put up something real or stop marketing your projects as free speech oriented.
More fake news from the Kosher Right…
There’s plenty more to get to. I have some show related announcements to make. I might even do some live OmeTV stuff if we run out of steam too quick.
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I’ll have much more to say about this when we meet tonight as we do every Wednesday at 9:30pm US Eastern for our SurrealPolitiks Members Only Video Chat.
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