Judge kicked prosecutor out of courtroom in retaliation for previous successful appeal, recusal motion says
U.S. District Judge Lynn Hughes of Houston. Wikimedia Commons.
Federal prosecutors alleged in a recusal motion that U.S. District Judge Lynn Hughes kicked a female prosecutor out of the courtroom and barred her from representing the government because of her successful appeal in a previous case.
Hughes denied the motion last Tuesday, the Texas Lawyer reports. The article has a summary of the motion’s allegations.
According to the motion, he told assistant U.S. Attorney Tina Ansari she was excused during a Jan. 14 pretrial hearing in the case United States v. Rodriguez. Then he kicked her out of the courtroom Jan. 18 and said she would not be allowed to participate in the case, according to motion.
When U.S. Attorney Ryan Patrick asked Hughes why he was banning Ansari, Hughes reportedly said that he wasn’t pleased with Ansari’s win in a prior case, United States v. Swenson. Hughes indicated he thought the appellate opinion in the case was based on lies and misrepresentations, the recusal motion said.
In that prior case, the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals at New Orleans reinstated an indictment last July and assigned the case to a new judge. Hughes had tossed the case because of prosecution discovery mistakes that included withholding a document file until the eve of trial.
The 5th Circuit’s July opinion had criticized February 2017 remarks by Hughes that allegedly referred to Ansari. “It was lot simpler when you guys wore dark suits, white shirts and navy ties,” Hughes had said. “We didn’t let girls do it in the old days.”
Even if Hughes was not referring to female prosecutors, the appeals court said, “such comments are demeaning, inappropriate and beneath the dignity of a federal judge.”
The Texas Lawyer contacted Hughes for comment on Thursday. He said the government’s recusal motion this week was “entirely a rehash of claims the assistant made, which were the product of putting three sentences of the record together and claiming they were addressed to her.”
