{"id":510,"date":"2026-06-17T17:11:29","date_gmt":"2026-06-17T17:11:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/modernhomejournals.com\/?p=510"},"modified":"2026-06-17T17:11:29","modified_gmt":"2026-06-17T17:11:29","slug":"broadview-six-activists-want-an-investigation-into-their-botched-prosecution","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/modernhomejournals.com\/?p=510","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Broadview Six\u2019 Activists Want an Investigation Into Their Botched Prosecution"},"content":{"rendered":"
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As the Justice Department races to distance itself from the missteps in the prosecution<\/u><\/span> of six anti-ICE protesters in Chicago, lawyers for those protesters \u2014 known as the \u201cBroadview six\u201d \u2014 are asking a federal judge to investigate the prosecutors who brought the case.<\/p>\n

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Lawyers for the group \u2014 which includes former Democratic congressional candidate Kat Abughazaleh<\/u><\/span> \u2014 filed a 27-page on Tuesday night laying out the reasons U.S. District Judge April Perry should appoint an independent investigator to look into the full extent of the prosecutors\u2019 misconduct. The DOJ, they say, can\u2019t be trusted to do it on its own.<\/p>\n

Andrew Boutros, the U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, dropped the case with prejudice \u2014 citing significant \u201cerrors\u201d in the grand jury presentations.<\/p>\n

\u201cAn independent special counsel to investigate the possible misconduct here is absolutely critical to ensuring the public impression of a neutral and trustworthy investigation,\u201d the group\u2019s lawyers wrote.<\/p>\n

Federal prosecutors made three attempts to indict the protesters for \u201cassaulting\u201d officers; it\u2019s practically unheard of to try to get an indictment more than once. Prosecutors dismissed grand jurors who were openly skeptical of the case presented by the government, and the experienced prosecutor leading the process, Sheri Mecklenburg, had private conversations with grand jurors despite strict rules forbidding such behavior.<\/p>\n

Boutros chalked up those actions to a couple of prosecutors making mistakes on their own.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is my very sincere belief, Your Honor, that no prosecutor acted intentionally in misleading you, and that there was no desire to mislead the Court and no deliberate misconduct on the part of the prosecutors,\u201d Boutros at a hearing on May 21.<\/p>\n

But that doesn\u2019t explain why other prosecutors then tried to stop the judge from reviewing the grand jury transcripts that proved what happened.<\/p>\n

Boutros has also tried to contain the damage by dropping the case \u2014 and his office recently made the extremely rare move of preemptively to pay defense lawyers\u2019 fees.<\/p>\n

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\u201cAs upset as you are and have been, I was upset as well,\u201d he told the judge last month. \u201cI too had not seen conduct like that, and it upset me, which is why we did dismiss that indictment.\u201d<\/p>\n

The ordeal cost Mecklenburg her temporary assignment advising Democrats on the Senate Justiciary Committee, a detail that was cut short<\/u><\/span> when NOTUS and other news organizations began asking about her mishandling of the prosecution. However, she remains employed at the U.S. Attorney\u2019s Office in Chicago, according to an office roster reviewed by an employee there. Her office phone went unanswered Wednesday morning and her voicemail was full.<\/p>\n

The Trump administration has routinely had Main Justice officials at headquarters put pressure on local offices to pursue certain politically charged cases with particularly harsh sentences. Defense lawyers point out, for instance, that associate deputy attorney general Aakash Singh, a high-ranking DOJ official, has a documented history<\/u><\/span> of directing local federal prosecutors.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s another reason that Christopher Parente, Joshua Herman and other defense lawyers on the case are now asking for an independent investigator to look into how \u2014 and why \u2014 the DOJ so aggressively pursued punishment for these street protesters.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo not appoint a special prosecutor here would enable the government\u2019s strategy to lay all that has happened on a single scapegoat, a convenient outcome for those who are eager to turn the page,\u201d they wrote. \u201cThe court has the authority, and we think the obligation, to ensure that those responsible for this unique and sorry chapter \u2026 are held to account.\u201d<\/p>\n

Judge Perry has not yet ruled on the motion. However, she has moved relatively quickly in this case. Boutros\u2019 office did not respond to a request for comment Wednesday morning.<\/p>\n

Earlier this month, both senators from Illinois, Senate Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Dick Durbin and Sen. Tammy Duckworth, called on Boutros to resign, citing his time in office as \u201criddled with chaos, deep internal dysfunction, and alleged misconduct.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The case against the Chicago activists was dropped last month after the Feds admitted to significant \u201cerrors.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":509,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-510","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-courts"],"yoast_head":"\n\u2018Broadview Six\u2019 Activists Want an Investigation Into Their Botched Prosecution - Modern Home Journals<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/modernhomejournals.com\/?p=510\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"\u2018Broadview Six\u2019 Activists Want an Investigation Into Their Botched Prosecution - Modern Home Journals\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The case against the Chicago activists was dropped last month after the Feds admitted to significant \u201cerrors.\u201d\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/modernhomejournals.com\/?p=510\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Modern Home Journals\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-06-17T17:11:29+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/modernhomejournals.com\\\/?p=510#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/modernhomejournals.com\\\/?p=510\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"admin\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/modernhomejournals.com\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/533de239efc09a2ab59959cc1bff86d0\"},\"headline\":\"\u2018Broadview Six\u2019 Activists Want an Investigation Into Their Botched Prosecution\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-06-17T17:11:29+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/modernhomejournals.com\\\/?p=510\"},\"wordCount\":699,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/modernhomejournals.com\\\/?p=510#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/modernhomejournals.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2026\\\/06\\\/7f12d6646129ae49e485a79d8b140864-scaled.jpg\",\"articleSection\":[\"Courts\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/modernhomejournals.com\\\/?p=510#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/modernhomejournals.com\\\/?p=510\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/modernhomejournals.com\\\/?p=510\",\"name\":\"\u2018Broadview Six\u2019 Activists Want an Investigation Into Their Botched Prosecution - Modern Home Journals\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/modernhomejournals.com\\\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/modernhomejournals.com\\\/?p=510#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/modernhomejournals.com\\\/?p=510#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/modernhomejournals.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2026\\\/06\\\/7f12d6646129ae49e485a79d8b140864-scaled.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-06-17T17:11:29+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/modernhomejournals.com\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/533de239efc09a2ab59959cc1bff86d0\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/modernhomejournals.com\\\/?p=510#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/modernhomejournals.com\\\/?p=510\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/modernhomejournals.com\\\/?p=510#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/modernhomejournals.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2026\\\/06\\\/7f12d6646129ae49e485a79d8b140864-scaled.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/modernhomejournals.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2026\\\/06\\\/7f12d6646129ae49e485a79d8b140864-scaled.jpg\",\"width\":2560,\"height\":1707,\"caption\":\"Protesters gather outside an ICE processing facility in the Chicago suburb of Broadview, Ill., Friday, Nov. 21, 2025. 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