Jeanine Pirro Extends Losing Streak As Grand Jury Refuses to Indict Woman Accused of Threatening Trump
(AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
Judge Jeanine Pirro, the former Fox News host turned top DOJ official, was dealt another blow by a Washington, DC grand jury.
Pirro, the U.S. attorney for Washington, DC, brought charges against Nathalie Rose Jones in mid-August for allegedly threatening to kill President Donald Trump, but Jones’s public defender sought on Monday to have her sent home after a grand jury refused to indict.
“Ms. Nathalie Rose Jones, through undersigned counsel, respectfully moves this Honorable Court to modify the conditions of her release in response to the grand jury’s return of a no bill,” read a public court filing on Monday from federal public defender A.J. Kramer.
Kramer added, “One of the factors the court considered in determining the conditions of release was the nature of the case and the weight of the evidence. A grand jury has now found no probable cause to indict Ms. Jones on the charged offenses. Given that finding, the weight of the evidence is weak. The government may intend to try again to obtain an indictment, but the evidence has not changed and no indictment is likely.”
Pirro crowed about bringing charges in a clip she posted to social media, declaring Jones’s “threats were on Facebook and Instagram and she continued to call the president a terrorist and was working to have him eliminated. She is now in custody. She will be prosecuted to the full extent of the law. Make no mistake about that.”
Pirro also failed to secure a grand jury indictment last month against a man who threw a Subway sandwich at a federal officer. The incident was caught on film and quickly went viral. Pirro also posted a clip boasting of that indictment before it was shot down, “He thought it was funny. Well, he doesn’t think it’s funny today because we charged him with a felony assault on a police officer, and we’re going to back the police to the hilt. So, there — stick your subway sandwich somewhere else.”
CNN’s Aaron Blake noted at the time how rare it is for a grand jury not to indict. “Federal prosecutors pursued over 160,000 cases against defendants in 2009-2010 … and grand juries only voted not to return an indictment in 11,” Blake wrote on social media, quoting from the Washington Post.
Pirro had also previously failed to secure an indictment against a man accused of attacking an FBI agent, with a grand jury voting three times against.
