Fani Willis and Nathan Wade
"Self-inflicted wounds" in the criminal RICO case against Donald Trump and 17 codefendants have placed Georgia district attorney Fani Willis in a bind and could put her career as a prosecutor at risk, according to a post from longtime Alabama attorney and criminal-defense expert Donald Watkins. The missteps essentially have turned the case on its head, making it less about Trump and more about Willis and her alleged romantic involvement with special prosecutor Nathan Wade, placing her in the middle of a divorce case Wade filed against his estranged wife, Jocelyn.
According to a report at PBS.org, Willis is accusing Jocelyn Wade of trying to obstruct the criminal election-interference case against Trump and others by seeking to question the DA in the Wades' divorce proceedings. Willis has filed a motion to quash a subpoena seeking her testimony in the divorce case.
Further, Willis accuses Jocelyn Wade of conspiring with interested parties in the Trump case to "annoy, embarrass, and oppress" the DA.
An attorney for Willis filed a Motion to Quash in the divorce court, stating: "On information and belief, as early as 2017, prior to Plaintiff Nathan J. Wade ever meeting Non-Party Deponent Willis, the parties to the above-styled divorce agreed that their marriage was irretrievably broken after the Defendant Jocelyn Wade confessed to an adulterous relationship with the Plaintiff’s longtime friend. The Defendant Jocelyn Wade’s adultery precluded any chance of reconciliation. From the Motion to Quash: . . .
Because the parties agree that the marriage is irretrievably broken and the concept of fault is not at issue, there is no information that District Attorney Willis could provide that might prove relevant to granting or denying the divorce. Thus, any information sought from District Attorney Willis would be irrelevant to the divorce proceedings pending in this Court. See Dickson v. Dickson, 238 Ga. 672, 674, 235 S.E.2d 479, 482 (1977) (holding judgment of divorce on pleadings is permitted where parties agree marriage irretrievably broken (citing Friedman v.Friedman, 233 Ga. 254, 210 S.E.2d 754 (1974)
As a result, the sought-after deposition in this case is outside the scope of the pending divorce action and outside the scope of discovery. . . The sought-after deposition of District Attorney Willis is not relevant to the subject matter involved in the pending action and should not be permitted.
Still, Watkins states, Willis has put herself in the position of having to perform a delicate balancing act. Under the headline "Fani T. Willis Has Fallen into the Abyss with Special Prosecutor Nathan J. Wade," Watkins writes:
Criminal cases involving high-profile politicians are fraught with danger for prosecutors and investigative reporters.
During the course of my legal career, I worked with the Alabama Attorney General and Montgomery County District Attorney to attack public corruption in several high-profile cases.
In 1992, I worked with Montgomery County District Attorney Jimmy Evans on the investigation and prosecution of Governor Guy Hunt on theft, conspiracy, and public-corruption charges. In 1993, Hunt was convicted on all charges and was forced from office by virtue of his conviction.
In 1974, Attorney General Bill Baxley appointed me to represent the state of Alabama in the criminal appeals of Talladega, Alabama, Police Lieutenant Jimmy Ray Hurst, who murdered Charles “Cooter” Mann. We won every round in the appellate process and Hurst remains in prison today.
From 1975 to 1977, I collaborated with Jimmy Evans in a criminal investigation that forced the resignations of Montgomery, Alabama’s mayor, police commissioner, and eight police officers who covered up the police murder of an unarmed and innocent man named Bernard Whitehurst.
In April 2013, the city of Montgomery finally acknowledged the police coverup in Whitehurst’s case.
As an online investigative journalist, Watkins has found he can come under attack from powerful political forces, just as he did in his role as an attorney. (Being attacked by powerful political forces is something I know about, too. See here, here here, here, here and here. Watkins and I brought the scandal of Gov. Robert "Luv Guv" Bentley -- in the form of an extramarital affair with senior aide Rebekah Caldwell Mason -- to public light over roughly seven months before the mainstream press paid it serious attention. Without our reporting, the story probably would have never been known to the public. Is it any wonder Bentley vowed vengeance against Watkins and me?): Writes Watkins:
As an investigative journalist, I exposed sex scandals that resulted in the forced resignations of Chief U.S. District Court Judge Mark E. Fuller (Montgomery, Alabama) in August 2015 and Gov. Robert Bentley in April 2017.
Gov. Robert Bentley, who viewed himself as the “Chief Magistrate of the State,” had a history of abusing the power of his office to unlawfully harass and retaliate against individuals who reported fraud, waste, and abuse to regulatory and law-enforcement agencies. See, Report of the House of Representatives Judiciary Committee on Articles of Impeachment Against Governor Robert Bentley Pursuant to House Rule 79.1, dated April 25, 2017, Attachment titled, Pre-Hearing Submission of Special Counsel regarding Governor Bentley’s “Special Investigations,” at pp. 86-92.
I was a target of Gov. Bentley’s “Special Investigations.” (Id. at p.87). Robert Bentley caused numerous state and federal agencies to investigate me for everything possible.
Law-enforcement agencies based in Alabama gleefully accommodated Bentley's many acts of retaliation against me. No state or federal law-enforcement agency protected me from Bentley's vengeance.
I literally survived a law-enforcement lynching. In the process, I learned who my true friends were.
However you come at it -- as a lawyer, journalist, or in some other role -- fighting corruption can present obstacles, Watkins writes:
The first technique corrupt politicians use against anti-corruption fighters is to jail them on phony criminal charges. I have faced a steady stream of such threats since 1975.
Efforts to jail me started with the Whitehurst case and ended in Birmingham, Alabama, with the successful fabrication of phony federal criminal charges against me in 2018 by Lloyd Peeples, a failed pizza store operator who was appointed as the First Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Alabama in 2017 despite his documented history of hostility toward successful Blacks.
(As longtime Legal Schnauzer readers know, I also was targeted for jailing because I reported accurately on subjects that displeased Republican political forces and made them uncomfortable. These forces included former governors Robert Bentley and Bob Riley -- along with his son Rob Riley -- and evidence suggests such forces also were involved in the wrongful foreclosure of our house in Birmingham and the wrongful eviction at our apartment in Greene County, Missouri, which resulted in an apparent sheriff's deputy breaking my wife Carol's arm, resulting in eight hours of trauma surgery for repair and more than $80,000 in expenses. She will lose at least 25 percent function in her left arm and could experience all kinds of unknown complications in the future. To this day, Carol and I are experiencing physical, emotional, and financial repercussions due to attacks from Alabama Republicans -- and we will live with some or all of those repercussions for the rest of our lives. Sadly, the forces that led to Carol's injuries and the loss of almost all our personal property appear to include my brother, Missouri attorney David Shuler -- who wrote a highly prejudicial letter to the judge in our eviction case and unlawfully ramrodded my parents' estate case so that I did not receive a penny -- even though related documents, such as a joint will, plainly state I was one of their four children, and upon my mother's death, was to receive an equal share to that of my siblings. I did not even receive a piece of paper notifying me of any estate-related proceedings. But I did find a document on my own that is so absurd that it's almost comical. We will have much more on that and other issues related to my parents' estate case in upcoming posts. I'm still researching these issues -- and estate matters are complex -- but I've seen evidence that suggests my brother might have engaged in estate fraud. Here is how the website of the Elster Law Firm in Missouri puts it.)
Watkins continues: The same business transactions that were used by Birmingham federal prosecutors to fabricate criminal charges against me had been reviewed two years earlier by top federal prosecutors in New Jersey, who cleared me of all wrongdoing. (Does this constitute double jeopardy? It sounds like it to my layperson's ears.)
The second technique corrupt politicians use to derail investigation into corruption is to smear the name of the anti-corruption fighter. The art of “smearing” flourished during the FBI’s official COINTELPRO program (1956 to 1971). “Smearing” is in continuous use by law-enforcement agencies across the South. In fact, it has become a staple of the state and federal criminal justice systems.
Lloyd Peeples: From pizza-store operator to prosecutor
The third technique is frequently used by corrupt politicians (as aided and abetted by their corporate allies) and involves the coordinated use of government and corporate resources to shut down law enforcement and journalistic investigations into their misconduct. The North Birmingham Bribery Case is a classic example of this technique.
In a high-profile case, such as the one against Donald Trump, a prosecutor must have her personal life together and surround herself with attorneys who are above reproach. That is where Willis failed, Watkins says:
Fulton County District Attorney Fani T. Willis is prosecuting the biggest state RICO case in America.
Every prosecutor who attacks corruption of any kind at the highest levels of government will be scrutinized for weaknesses, mistakes, and ethical lapses. It goes with the turf.
Montgomery County District Attorney Jimmy Evans was crucified for prosecuting Gov. Guy Hunt on theft, conspiracy, and ethics violation charges and for indicting three Montgomery police officers for perjury in the Bernard Whitehurst case.
Alabama Attorney General Bill Baxley was ostracized for appointing me, a Black attorney, to represent the state in opposing Lt. Jimmy Ray Hurst’s criminal appeals from his murder conviction in a case where all of the parties were White.
High-profile criminal prosecutions require an “A-Team” approach. Every action the prosecutor undertakes in his/her personal and professional life is scrutinized.
Every member of Fani Willis’ “A-Team” is subject to heightened scrutiny.
In Willis’ RICO case against Donald Trump, it is clear that special prosecutor Nathan J. Wade does not qualify as an “A-Team” member. In fact, Wade is Willis’ “Archilles heel.
Through Wade and his ongoing divorce case, the public is getting a front-row seat to a nasty “love triangle” between Fani Willis, Nathan Wade, and Wade’s estranged wife, Jocelyn.
Based on credit-card receipts that were released Friday in the Wade divorce case, we now know that payments to Nathan Wade that were approved by Fani Willis paid for airfare, cruises, and vacations to exotic ports of call for Willis and Wade.
What is worse, Willis is directly attacking Jocelyn Wade. This is a huge strategic and tactical mistake. It is also unprofessional.
Nathan Wade’s lack of objective qualifications as a RICO prosecutor, his messy divorce situation, and Fani Willis’ entanglement in all of this threatens to destroy her career as a prosecutor.
At some point, Fani Willis’ staunchest allies will not be able to ignore the continuous flow of damning information about Nathan J. Wade. When this point is reached, Fani Willis will be doomed.
