The White House now claims that over 1,000 arrests have been made since the August 11 beginning of the surge of federal law enforcement in Washington, D.C. However, many of these cases will not lead to convictions. Federal judges have dismissed cases, grand juries have repeatedly refused to issue indictments, federal judges have berated prosecutors for violating defendants’ rights and court rules, a federal magistrate judge criticized the tactics used in an arrest saying that it was the “most illegal search I’ve seen in my life” and described another arrest as lacking “basic human dignity.”
A judge criticizing a prosecutor may not be headline news, however grand juries which on multiple occasions are unable to find probable cause is considered unusual. Earlier this year there was a similar pattern after the pro-immigrant protests in Los Angeles, where federal grand juries repeatedly refused to issue indictments against citizens peacefully exercising their First Amendment rights.
