The Georgia Attorney General’s Office announced Tuesday it was dropping a number of money-laundering charges against some of the 61 indicted protesters of the Atlanta Public Safety Training Center.
A total of 15 money-laundering charges against Marlon Kautz, Adele Maclean and Savannah Patterson were dismissed. The charges stemmed from their involvement in the Atlanta Solidarity Fund, which prosecutors alleged raised bail money for people arrested protesting the training center.
Attorney Don Samuel, whose law firm represents all three, said his clients were delighted that they now only face one count of RICO, instead of 16 total counts.
“The government read our briefs and all the papers for the first time last night and realized that it did not properly allege the offense so it’s dismissed and the judge had no questions,” Samuel said. The judge “agreed the money-laundering charges don’t even allege a crime.”
In a statement, the AG’s office said they “chose not to proceed” with the money-laundering charges but the RICO charges remain. Samuel said he thinks the state knew Fulton County Superior Court Judge Kimberly Adams was going to dismiss those charges so they did it voluntarily.
In a motion filed Thursday, Deputy Attorney General John Fowler wrote that the decision to drop the charges was made after “a review of relevant caselaw” and “given potential vagueness” of the counts in the indictment. Fowler noted that the state reserves the right to re-present the charges to a grand jury, but Samuel said he doesn’t expect the state to do so, since it will add another year for the case.
Credit: NATRICE MILLER
Credit: NATRICE MILLER
The indictment, which was filed in August 2023, named the three as bail fund organizers who were arrested in May 2023 during a raid at a home on Mayson Avenue.
A total of 225 “overt acts” are cited in the indictment — starting with two defendants throwing objects and a Molotov cocktail at the Georgia State Patrol headquarters on July 5, 2020, and ending with incidents that occurred two weeks before the indictment was revealed.
Most of the acts mentioned in the indictment involved the three defendants transferring money from the Network for Strong Communities to allegedly reimburse and fund those occupying the forest. According to Secretary of State records, Maclean serves as the CEO, Kautz as the CFO and Patterson as the secretary for Network for Strong Communities, which was formed in August 2020 and the principal office address is the home on Mayson Avenue.
The three are also accused of being involved, along with unindicted co-conspirators, with threatening and promoting violence and property damage toward companies involved in the construction of the training center.
Most of the monetary transfers cited in the indictment are for nominal amounts of less than $100. The ruling comes about two weeks after the judge allowed the AG’s office to remain on the case, over Samuel’s call for their removal.
On Tuesday, Adams also heard argument from Samuel and other attorneys about dismissing the RICO count, but didn’t rule.
Samuel argued that officials with the AG’s office and Atlanta Police Department, as part of their investigation into Kautz, Maclean and Patterson, had accessed attorney-client privileged communication and later shared those emails with attorneys representing the other 58 defendants.
Although she allowed the AG’s office to continue to prosecute the case, in an Aug. 30 order, the judge admonished the state and warned that any future misconduct would result in “additional sanctions as determined appropriate.”
Adams also ordered the state to provide within 10 days a list of all the individuals who may have possessed and/or received the emails and a copy of all the warrants the state has used to obtain similar materials. Prosecutors were ordered to meet with the defense and establish a filter team to go through materials seized by law enforcement in a similar way.
Samuel said prosecutors followed those instructions.
The first defendant that was set to go to trial was Ayla King, after filing the only speedy trial demand of the defendants. However, her trial is currently on hold as they await a ruling from the Georgia Court of Appeals.
Once King’s trial is finished, Adams expects to begin prosecuting the remaining 60 defendants in groups of five with Patterson, Kautz and MacLean among the first group.
Opponents of the training center gathered at City Hall on Monday to protest the city’s lack of action, one year after they submitted more than 100,000 signatures in an effort to put the controversial facility on the ballot. The referendum effort is currently in limbo until the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rules on an issue that will help determine the validity of some of the petition signatures.
The city said it expects the facility to be complete and operational by December.
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