"The Fourth Indictment Story" 4 stars! ⭐⭐⭐⭐
For the fourth time in 4.5 months, former president* T**** has been indicted on criminal charges.
Never achieved even once by a president in our entire 247-year history, the four-time champ will remain tops for a long, long time!
Late Monday night, a Fulton County, Georgia grand jury signed an indictment brought to them by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis.
And girl, what an indictment it is!
Today LSR will look at the indictment itself and the ramifications of this one. It's different than the ones before, in important ways. Let's look, shall we?
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| Ann Telnaes |
The indictment is big. It's beefy. Puttin' people in prison! Pretty peachy!
Read the full indictment here. It's 97 pages long, although the first eight pages consist of the list of charges and defendants along with pages set aside for the defendants' pleas. This document is longer and is not as readable as the "speaking indictment" style that Jack Smith presented. But it's nicely chronologically arranged by all the odious acts that the criminal ring committed in order to try to overthrow our democracy. Read at least the first few pages that describes the arc of the conspiracy if you don't read the whole thing.
I did read the indictment – errr, most of it, skimming other parts of it. So today we rely on Those Who Know A Lot About Stuff to help us out.
Bigguns and Small Fry
There are 19 defendants in all. The defendants run the gamut, starting with the ringleader. You may have heard of him. He's the former supposed leader of the free world, who lost his re-election bid for president of the United States. Orange guy? Can't dance? His 18 co-conspirators range from his right-hand-colluder Mike Meadows, way down to a local election official in tiny (population 43,386) Coffee County, Georgia.
The Whole Goddam Bunch
Willis's net catches the whole goddam bunch: the main players, including T**** lawyers Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman, and Sidney Powell, to the Department of Justice official and would-be director of the Justice Department Jeffrey Clark, plus a name we haven't come across in the federal indictment: Former T**** Chief of Staff Mark Meadows. The mid-level defendants are some Georgia attorneys, the chairman of the Georgia GOP, and a few of the fake electors, one of whom (Shawn Still) is a sitting Georgia state senator. The rest of the bunch are lower-level than that.
There are a total of 41 counts, sprinkled over the 19 defendants, with multiple defendants being charged with the same count, so that in total there are a sprawling 135 charges against the 19 co-conspirators. Donny and Rudy share the lead with 13 counts each.
The Washington Post has a nifty graphic of the charges count.
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| The Washington Post |
The Acts
The bulk of the indictment, pages 20-68, consists of the description of the acts that the defendants committed in the commission of this huge conspiracy.
It's not just the pressure-campaign "I need 11,000 votes" phone call that T**** made to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger. Nope, there are 161 individual acts of criminal behavior or acts in furtherance of the crime. In fact, that phone call is not until Act #112. T****'s acts started on November 4, 2020, the day after the election, when he falsely claimed that he won the election, and continued all the way into September, 2021, when T**** continued badgering Raffensperger to make statements about the election in Georgia. Yes, a full eight months after President Biden was sworn in, the former guy was still bullying Raffensperger.
The listed acts finally end in September, 2022, when a couple of the defendants committed perjury when testifying about the facts of the nefarious goings-on in Georgia post-election.
The acts section includes "overt acts," which are part of the overall conspiracy plot but are not necessarily illegal acts in and of themselves, as well as "predicate acts," which are the outright illegal acts that fall under the racketeering charges. Being able to include the overt acts is an elegant piece to a RICO indictment.
This overarching story is thanks to the RICO law, which allows the prosecutor to tell a larger story than simply the individual criminal acts. Using RICO allows the narrative to include multiple defendants in multiple jurisdictions over a long period of time and allows these overt acts to be included, as a way to illustrate all the actions undertaken by the conspirators to further their criminal enterprise.
The grandpappy charges stem from RICO: Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations law. RICO was first enacted by Congress as a way to capture the conspiracies perpetrated by the mob. It allowed prosecution of mafia bosses who tried to shift blame for their misdeeds on underlings who committed crimes on their behalf. (Irony alert! Rudy Giuliani, in his better days, was quite successful in bringing convictions against mobsters and Wall Street insiders using RICO in New York)
In 1981, Georgia enacted its own version, and it's special. It is more broad than the federal version and allows the prosecutor to include evidence that might not stand on its own if not for the overreaching RICO charge. Prosecutors can also include actions that were done in jurisdictions outside the state, so long as the acts were done in furtherance of the conspiracies being charged. This is why you see Willis's indictment include actions undertaken in Michigan, Arizona, New Mexico, and other states where attempts were made to overturn those states' elections as well.
Another positive for us: Georgia RICO charges have a mandatory jail term. There is no option for probation for those convicted under the RICO law. Whoo-hoooo!
The downside to using RICO: well, we see it here: the case gets big and complicated, and as such will be a much more complex case. A more complicated case may confuse or frustrate a jury. And it will take a long time to try.
With so many defendants, however, there is a greater likelihood that plea deals will be made and the defendant list will shrink.
For now, Ms. Willis plans to try all of the 19 co-defendants together. It is possible that some of them of them will provide evidence against the main man. This is common in RICO cases. We'll see what happens before the trial starts.
Flipper, is that you?
The Unindicted Co-conspirators
They number 30. Let's get ready for some insider evidence! As we know, three of the defendants are part of the slate of "fake electors," so that leaves 13 of the slate to be among the 30 unindicted co-conspirators.
Who are the rest? I'll let Alex Woodward from The Independent tell you about them.
Once the indictment was signed, a warrant was automatically issued for the arrest of all the defendants. D.A. Willis gave all the defendants until Friday, August 25 to turn themselves in.
According to Fulton County Sheriff Pat Labat, they will be taken into custody and booked just like any other defendant. "It doesn’t matter your status. We have a mugshot ready for you," Labat said. The arrests will be made at the county jail, not the courthouse like in the federal cases. This makes me smile, because jail is the most fitting place, in any circumstance, for the orange turd. It's ugly and it stinks. I was married to a cop. When he came home from a shift, I could immediately tell when he had been to the jail. Jail stinks. And the stink stays on you.
Judge Scott McAfee was assigned the case. A brand-new appointee, he has been on the Georgia bench for a full six months. Appointed by Republican Gov. Brian Kemp, McAfee has been praised by Kemp as "a tough prosecutor" who will "bring those to justice who break the law." Though new to the bench, he has served the courts for a long time. McAfee is a former Georgia state and federal prosecutor and state inspector general. From the Washington Post's write up, he sounds like a fair and deliberate jurist. For those who hit a paywall on the WaPo's site, here is a summary from The Hill.
There is overlap.
There is plenty of overlap, with this indictment and the federal indictment both charging crimes for the fake elector scheme and the Mike Pence affair, among other threads, but the Georgia case hits the specifics of the breach of ballot machines, the intimidation of Secretary of State Raffensperger, and the vilification of Ruby Freeman.
T**** can't make it go away.
Cases brought by a state are not subject to pardon by a sitting U.S. president. Nor will the case be able to disappear by the snap of a newly-elected president's fingers. So win or lose in 2024, dear, you'll be sitting in that defendant's chair.
No pardon. No dice.
Not only that, but a state pardon is different in Georgia than in other states. Georgia's pardon process is undertaken by the five-member State Board of Pardons and Paroles, and pardons are only eligible after the convicted serves five years of his jail term. So there!
Speaking of jail...
RICO cases have mandatory jail time. There is no probation for racketeering. The mandatory minimum is five years. Let's get that guy into orange from head to toe! Literally!
Televised trial
Also unlike the federal cases, Georgia has no restriction on televised trials. We will get to witness every uncomfortable shift of his butt and every beady stare-down of his once-synergic sycophants.
Potential Problems
There is a lot of overlap of this case and the federal January 6 case, but there are many differences. The Georgia indictment is so huge that it will take a long time to work through the system. With 19 co-defendants and 19 attorney teams and potentially hundreds of motions and delays, the start may not even happen in the six months that Fani Willis wants.
Jack Smith's case is much more streamlined and pointed. One defendant, four charges. It can move more quickly, and it should. Federal cases generally take precedence. We will likely be reporting on Willis's case long after the election.
And if T**** does manage to get elected (but we are not going to let that happen) in 2024, we could reasonably assume that he could not be prosecuted while in office due to the Justice Department's opinion.
Here's an excellent analysis in WaPo about the ins and outs of the two cases. And here is one from Politico: Keep your eyes on Jack Smith.
What's next?
Court dates
- Arraignment will be on Tuesday, September 5.
- Fani Willis is asking for a March 4, 2024 trial date. FYI, that's the day before Super Tuesday.
Ruby Freeman's Vindication
The harassment and intimidation toward Ruby Freemen went a lot further than we were aware. The indictment describes it fully, and it was ugly. Look at Act 87 forward. Oh. my. gawd. It's awful! T**** gets directly involved in the plot against Ms. Freeman, as shown in Act 113. The ugliness continued in Acts 115 to 120.
This patriotic individual – doing her duty to her county as a volunteer to assist in the election in her precinct – was harmed. The life of Lady Ruby and that of her daughter, Shaye Moss will never be the same. It's maddening, and someone needs to pay for that harm. Do you remember their heartbreaking testimony during the January 6 Congressional hearings?
I'm glad that Ms. Willis has included the assault to Ms. Freeman's good name as a separate charge against these co-conspirators.
The Meadows Factor
Mark Meadows has already filed a motion to move the case to federal court. Less than 24 hours after the indictment came down, he petitioned the court. His rationale? That his actions were performed as part of his duties as an official in the executive branch. The trouble is, sir, that an official of the executive branch has no business visiting a state's ballot site, nor in telephoning a state election official for any reason at all, let alone regarding matters of overturning the results of a free and fair election in that state. A judge will understand this, I'm confident, and will not approve the motion.
I still want to know why he was a ghost in the federal January 6 indictment.
In any case, T**** himself is expected to also file a motion under the same pretense to move the case from the state court to the Federal Court in Georgia. He certainly wasn't acting under his official duties, either. The judge will agree with me. We don't want this move to happen, because not only would T**** be able to more easily slow the proceedings down, he could potentially get a friendlier jury in federal court.
Freedom of Speech?
I love that his many of T****'s tweets and lies are coming back in this indictment to bite him in the ass. Yeah, yeah, he'll claim First Amendment rights. Once again, little man, you do not have the right to say or write things that are part of a criminal act. A person cannot claim freedom of speech when he goes masked onto Fifth Avenue and says, "Gimme all your money or else I'll shoot you in the face!"
Here is a good write-up about 10 of the 30,573 lies that he told while in the Whitewash House that come back to visit him in the Georgia indictment.
Speaking of tweets
Side tidbit about the federal case: It's come to light that the Special Prosecutor Jack Smith had quite the time subpoenaing the tweets and DMs from T****'s Twitter account. In the end, however, only publicly published tweets were cited in the indictment. We will have to wait until trial to see if any of the more private stuff gets entered into evidence.
Total scorecard: United States 91, T**** 0
There are a total of 91 – count 'em – 91 charges across the four indictments. Give us one "guilty." Just one. Who am I kidding? Give us all of them!!
Melting Pot
The indictment lists the names of the members of the grand jury. Most of the time, jurors names are not published. Georgia is different. As I look at the names, I am gratified by the melting pot represented there. It sounds like America. I love it!
The dark side: MAGAts have already started doxxing the grand jurors' addresses. They make me so mad, and I hope that they are caught and prosecuted.
ex·on·er·a·tion
Back in February, he posted this on Truth Social: "Thank you to the Special Grand Jury in the Great State of Georgia for your Patriotism & Courage. Total exoneration. The USA is very proud of you!!!"
Aw, honey, I get it. It's a big word, a full five syllables. Back to the vocabulary study! (By the way, you may want to look harder at "indict." It's in·dict not INDICATE)
The Marquess of Queensberry?
Act 130 describes more of T****'s bullying attempts toward Mike Pence, trying to goad him into breaking his oath and destroying the Constitution. The act says in part, "DONALD JOHN TRUMP stated that Pence had the power to decertify the November 3, 2020, presidential election results, that people cheated, and that Pence wanted to 'play by Marquess of Queensberry rules.'" I had to look it up, so I share with you in case you don't know much about boxing.
A couple side notes
- Remember when Magistrate Judge Moxila A. Upadhyaya warned T**** in the last arraignment to not commit crimes? No surprise: he has already broken that condition. Hours before the grand jury voted, he truth-socialed, "I am reading reports that failed former Lt. Governor, Jeff [misspelling of Geoff] Duncan, will be testifying before the Fulton County Grand Jury. He shouldn’t." Can you say witness intimidation?
- Two Constitutional scholars – conservatives, both – are publishing a paper in University of Pennsylvania Law Review asserting that T**** is already disqualified from running again according to the 14th Amendment. He is barred from office due to a provision that, as written in the LA Times, "bars state and federal office those who, having previously taken an oath of office to support the Constitution, participate in an insurrection or give support to insurrectionists."
- And a side-side note. Maui needs your help. The fire is the worst in the last 100 years of American history. Please consider donating to Direct Relief International, Maui Strong Foundation, or the Maui Food Bank.
And now, what you've all been waiting for.
The memes 'n' toons.
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| John Deering |
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| Chris Britt |
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| Steve Breen |
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| Joe Heller |
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| Nick Anderson |
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| Monte Wolverton |
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