Eastern District of California Blog

Feds Report Illegal Marijuana Growers in National Forests Using Banned Pesticides

California law enforcement has learned that Mexican drug traffickers are using a dangerous pesticide banned in the United States to grow marijuana in remote areas of California’s Sierra Nevada mountains, and are going after their operations.

The pesticide, carbofuran, is toxic to wildlife and humans and can cause permanent reproductive damage. Law enforcement took reporters on a tour of one of the illegal grow sites on Tuesday, where a bottle of carbofuran could be seen.

“These are federal lands, and they are being systematically destroyed through clear-cutting, stream diversion, chemicals and pesticides,” said U.S. Atty. McGregor Scott at a news conference, where he was joined by federal, state and local officials who were part of the investigation. “It’s a vitally important issue.”

LA Times, 8/21/19

Not Guilty Verdict in Misdemeanor Bench Trial Today

Congratulations to Assistant Federal Defender Linda Allison for her not guilty bench trial verdict today on a misdemeanor charge of failing to submit bags at a Social Security Office (41 CFR 102-74.370)  in United States v. Ardrey, No. 2:19-po-00026-CKD.

EDCA Jury Returns Guilty Verdict Friday in Voting Fraud Case

A federal jury Friday convicted a 64-year-old man of acquiring the identity of an American citizen in the early 1990s, using it to get a passport and vote in federal elections, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office for the Eastern District of California.

Prosecutors said Gustavo Araujo Lerma was born in Mexico in 1955, but was living in Sacramento as an undocumented resident. He began going by Hiram Velez when he obtained the identity of an American man by that name, according to the office of U.S. Attorney McGregor W. Scott.

Lerma insisted he was born as Velez in the U.S. and testified he was a fan of President Trump, according to one report.

SF Chronicle, 8/23/19

Voter Fraud Trial Starts Today In Sacramento

For years, President Trump has claimed that millions of noncitizens voted in the 2016 presidential election, unfairly skewing his vote as Democrat Hillary Clinton won the popular vote but lost the Electoral College.

On Monday in federal court in Sacramento, a man accused of coming to the United States from Mexico and voting illegally in elections for the past 20 years went on trial on charges of aggravated identity theft, voting by an alien and making a false statement on a passport application.

But there’s a twist.

Gustavo Araujo Lerma is an avowed Trump supporter, and evidence expected to be introduced in his trial includes letters of thanks from Trump, former Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus and current RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel.

The letter was addressed to Hiram Enrique Velez – the name of a deceased American citizen whose identity Lerma allegedly assumed years ago to win legal status for his wife and their two children, who were all born in Mexico, according to prosecutors.

“The evidence will show that the defendant was born in Mexico in 1955, married a woman named Maria Manriquez in 1982, and had two children with her in Mexico in the 1980s,” according to a trial brief filed by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Katherine Lydon and Shea Kenny. “By the early 1990s, he began living in the United States, fraudulently using the identity of a Puerto Rican-born United States citizen named Hiram Velez.”

A June 2, 2017, letter from Trump to the defendant assures him that the president and Vice President Mike Pence “are deeply grateful for your resolve to help us make American safer, stronger and more prosperous than ever before.”

Sac Bee, 8/19/19

Hamid Hayat Released From Prison Friday

Hamid Hayat, the Lodi man who spent 14 years behind bars in a one of the most controversial terrorism cases of the post-Sept. 11 era, said Sunday that he’s “still in shock” after his release from federal prison in Arizona.

“I’m lost for words,” Hayat said through tears during a news conference in Sacramento, his first public appearance in California since a judge overturned his 2006 conviction, freeing him from prison Friday.

“I can’t believe this day came,” said Hayat, 36. “I still think this is a dream. I wake up and I still think I’m in prison.”

Hayat’s conviction in federal court in Sacramento for allegedly supporting terrorists by training with them in his family homeland of Pakistan was overturned July 30 by a federal judge, who said Hayat’s defense had been harmed by his inexperienced trial lawyer’s failure to call alibi witnesses.

SF Chronicle, 8/11/19

SF Chronicle photo: Retired FBI agent, Jim Wedick, takes selfie with Hamid Hyat.

Trump Request to Enjoin California's Tax Return Law To Be Heard September 5

According to BloombergTax News, Trump campaign's request to issue an injunction blocking California from enforcing its law requiring presidential and gubernatorial candidates to release five years of tax returns to get on the primary ballot will be heard by U.S. District Judge Morrison C. England, Jr., on September 5, 2019.  The case, 2:19-CV-1501-MCE-DB, had previously been reassigned to Judge England.

Trump and Republican Party Challenge California Law Requiring Candidates To Release Tax Returns

Here's the lede from Tuesday's Sacramento Bee story on Trump's EDCA court challenge [No. 2:19-CV-1501-TLN-AC] to California's law requiring that candidates for president and government release five years of tax returns to get on the primary ballot:

The Trump campaign and Republican Party sued California on Tuesday over a new law requiring presidential candidates to release their tax returns to run in the state's primary, legislation that was aimed at prying loose President Donald Trump's returns.

California's law is "a naked political attack against the sitting President of the United States," the state and national Republican parties argued in one of two lawsuits filed in U.S. District Court in Sacramento.

The law signed last week by Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom requires candidates for president and governor to release five years of tax returns to appear on the state's primary ballot, but the requirement does not extend to the general election. Trump has refused to release his returns, saying they are under audit.

 

Family of Brandon Smith File Wrongful Death Suit in EDCA Court

The mother and children of a man who died in Sacramento police custody last year have sued the city of Sacramento and Sacramento County in federal court.

Brandon Smith’s mother, Yolanda Smith, along with his three minor children, represented by guardian Keyanna Washington, filed the wrongful death lawsuit last week in federal court.

The lawsuit, filed by high-profile civil rights attorney John Burris on behalf of the family, names the city and county as defendants. It also names county Department of Behavioral Health mental health counselor Elizabeth Almendarez; California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation parole officers Angelle Garner and PA Mosby; and Sacramento police officer Marcus Frank as defendants.

Sac Bee, 7/30/19

 

Hayat's Attorneys Move For Immediate Release Pending Potential Gov't Appeal

Four days after a federal judge vacated the conviction and sentence of Lodi terror suspect Hamid Hayat, his attorneys filed a motion Friday seeking Hayat’s immediate release from an Arizona prison and asking that he be allowed to return home.

“Defendant Hayat has been in custody in this matter since June 2005 – i.e., a period of more than 14 years – for convictions that this court has now vacated,” San Francisco attorney Dennis Riordan wrote in a motion filed in federal court in Sacramento. “The court’s July 30 order essentially found that Hayat’s trial counsel failed to investigate and present critical evidence of her client’s innocence to the jury at defendant’s trial in 2006, and that such failure fundamentally under mines confidence in the resulting verdict.”

Despite the order by U.S. District Judge Garland E. Burrell Jr. on Tuesday, Hayat remains in custody at a federal prison outside Phoenix, and his attorneys say he should be returned home on his own recognizance while the Justice Department decides whether to appeal the decision.

Sac Bee, 8/2/19