{"id":138270,"date":"2025-12-05T12:09:15","date_gmt":"2025-12-05T20:09:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2025\/12\/05\/doj-adds-another-no-bill-to-its-trophy-case\/"},"modified":"2025-12-05T12:09:15","modified_gmt":"2025-12-05T20:09:15","slug":"doj-adds-another-no-bill-to-its-trophy-case","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2025\/12\/05\/doj-adds-another-no-bill-to-its-trophy-case\/","title":{"rendered":"DOJ Adds Another No Bill To Its Trophy Case"},"content":{"rendered":"

Donald Trump\u2019s Ragin\u2019 Revenge Tour bombed in yet another venue yesterday, as a grand jury in Norfolk no-billed his effort to reindict New York Attorney General Letitia James. As ABC<\/a> and MSNOW<\/a> were first to report, the jurors didn\u2019t buy the claim that James lied on a 2020 mortgage application to purchase a house in Virginia for her niece to live in. Turns out it\u2019s not so easy to get a true bill when you\u2019re competent and care about ethics!<\/p>\n

The case was doomed from the outset. Florida insurance lawyer Lindsey Halligan was LARPing as US Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia on a legal theory which had already been rejected by three \u2014 and now five!\u2014 federal courts. The New York Times<\/a> reported that a grand jury in Norfolk heard testimony from the niece in June, who insisted that she never paid rent. But when Halligan presented to a grand jury in Alexandria in October, the niece was never called. When Lawfare<\/a> reporter Anna Bower tweeted out the Times story, Halligan messaged her on Signal, insisting that the reporting was wrong and then demanding after the fact that the conversation be off the record.<\/p>\n

Halligan\u2019s predecessor, career prosecutor Erik Seibert, refused to indict on such patently flimsy charges. Which is why Trump pushed him out and forced Attorney General Bondi to install Halligan. <\/p>\n

\"\"
<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

And so it\u2019s perhaps unsurprising that none of the line attorneys at EDVA would get anywhere near the case, leaving Halligan alone to present to the grand jury. Just before Thanksgiving, Judge Cameron Currie ruled<\/a> that Halligan was never validly appointed, and since her name was the only one on the indictment, the case was dismissed.<\/p>\n

Bondi vowed to appeal<\/a>, but so far the government hasn\u2019t asked the Fourth Circuit to weigh in. Perhaps it dawned on someone at Main Justice that a \u201cwin\u201d would simply reanimate the original, terrible James case, along with the even more defective Comey indictment. Instead, they\u2019ve opted to try to replicate the charges, minus some of the more glaring defects. But apparently the defects were what made the case possible in the first place.<\/p>\n

In the meantime, courts in EDVA are getting a little tired of Halligan\u2019s act. CNN<\/a> reports that judges are refusing to accept as-written filings that refer to her as the acting US Attorney.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe law in this district right now is that she is not and has not been the United States Attorney,\u201d snapped Magistrate Judge William Fitzpatrick on Tuesday. As CNN notes, this sentiment was echoed by Judge Michael Nachmanoff and Magistrate Lindsey Vaala, who observed that the government is bound by Judge Currie\u2019s ruling, particularly in the absence of an appeal or even a request for stay. Notably, the Comey indictment was returned to Judge Vaala, assigned to Judge Nachmanoff, and handed off to Judge Fitzpatrick to adjudicate the privilege dispute. Whether this is a comment on Halligan\u2019s skills by the judges who\u2019ve seen her in action is left as an exercise for the reader. <\/p>\n

The Comey case is now time barred, although the government claims it\u2019s entitled to a six-month Rumspringa. But the statute of limitations on mortgage fraud is 10 years. If she\u2019s so inclined, Halligan, who has now been appointed as special counsel, can present to a new grand jury every week until she hits paydirt. Maybe with a bit of practice, she could get somewhere near competent \u2026 or disbarred, whichever comes first.<\/p>\n

\n

Liz Dye<\/a>\u00a0lives in Baltimore where she produces the Law and Chaos\u00a0substack<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0podcast<\/a>.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

The post DOJ Adds Another No Bill To Its Trophy Case<\/a> appeared first on Above the Law<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Donald Trump\u2019s Ragin\u2019 Revenge Tour bombed in yet another venue yesterday, as a grand jury in Norfolk no-billed his effort to reindict New York Attorney General Letitia James. As ABC<\/a> and MSNOW<\/a> were first to report, the jurors didn\u2019t buy the claim that James lied on a 2020 mortgage application to purchase a house in Virginia for her niece to live in. Turns out it\u2019s not so easy to get a true bill when you\u2019re competent and care about ethics!<\/p>\n

The case was doomed from the outset. Florida insurance lawyer Lindsey Halligan was LARPing as US Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia on a legal theory which had already been rejected by three \u2014 and now five!\u2014 federal courts. The New York Times<\/a> reported that a grand jury in Norfolk heard testimony from the niece in June, who insisted that she never paid rent. But when Halligan presented to a grand jury in Alexandria in October, the niece was never called. When Lawfare<\/a> reporter Anna Bower tweeted out the Times story, Halligan messaged her on Signal, insisting that the reporting was wrong and then demanding after the fact that the conversation be off the record.<\/p>\n

Halligan\u2019s predecessor, career prosecutor Erik Seibert, refused to indict on such patently flimsy charges. Which is why Trump pushed him out and forced Attorney General Bondi to install Halligan. <\/p>\n

\"\"
<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

And so it\u2019s perhaps unsurprising that none of the line attorneys at EDVA would get anywhere near the case, leaving Halligan alone to present to the grand jury. Just before Thanksgiving, Judge Cameron Currie ruled<\/a> that Halligan was never validly appointed, and since her name was the only one on the indictment, the case was dismissed.<\/p>\n

Bondi vowed to appeal<\/a>, but so far the government hasn\u2019t asked the Fourth Circuit to weigh in. Perhaps it dawned on someone at Main Justice that a \u201cwin\u201d would simply reanimate the original, terrible James case, along with the even more defective Comey indictment. Instead, they\u2019ve opted to try to replicate the charges, minus some of the more glaring defects. But apparently the defects were what made the case possible in the first place.<\/p>\n

In the meantime, courts in EDVA are getting a little tired of Halligan\u2019s act. CNN<\/a> reports that judges are refusing to accept as-written filings that refer to her as the acting US Attorney.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe law in this district right now is that she is not and has not been the United States Attorney,\u201d snapped Magistrate Judge William Fitzpatrick on Tuesday. As CNN notes, this sentiment was echoed by Judge Michael Nachmanoff and Magistrate Lindsey Vaala, who observed that the government is bound by Judge Currie\u2019s ruling, particularly in the absence of an appeal or even a request for stay. Notably, the Comey indictment was returned to Judge Vaala, assigned to Judge Nachmanoff, and handed off to Judge Fitzpatrick to adjudicate the privilege dispute. Whether this is a comment on Halligan\u2019s skills by the judges who\u2019ve seen her in action is left as an exercise for the reader. <\/p>\n

The Comey case is now time barred, although the government claims it\u2019s entitled to a six-month Rumspringa. But the statute of limitations on mortgage fraud is 10 years. If she\u2019s so inclined, Halligan, who has now been appointed as special counsel, can present to a new grand jury every week until she hits paydirt. Maybe with a bit of practice, she could get somewhere near competent \u2026 or disbarred, whichever comes first.<\/p>\n

\n

Liz Dye<\/a>\u00a0lives in Baltimore where she produces the Law and Chaos\u00a0substack<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0podcast<\/a>.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Donald Trump\u2019s Ragin\u2019 Revenge Tour bombed in yet another venue yesterday, as a grand jury in Norfolk no-billed his effort to reindict New York Attorney General Letitia James. As ABC and MSNOW were first to report, the jurors didn\u2019t buy the claim that James lied on a 2020 mortgage application to purchase a house in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":138231,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-138270","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-above_the_law"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/xira.com\/p\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Screenshot-2025-12-05-at-11.52.54-AM-coKJcU.png?fit=874%2C892&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138270","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=138270"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138270\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/138231"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=138270"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=138270"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=138270"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}