The U.S. Department of Justice has wasted four years and untold millions of tax dollars on the wrongful prosecution of award-winning journalists and former Backpage owners Michael Lacey and Jim Larkin. Given the opportunity, the DOJ may waste more. Because…
On April 6, 2018, the U.S. government set a disturbing precedent in the annals of modern censorship by arresting award-winning newspapermen Michael Lacey and Jim Larkin and taking down Backpage.com, a classified ads site that reportedly served almost 1,000 cities…
Forget smoking guns. In an appellate brief filed recently at the Ninth Circuit, defense attorneys in the Lacey/Larkin case offer a series of flaming bazookas, detailing the prosecution’s unabashed intent to force the defense to move for a mistrial (and…
Editor’s note: Since this piece was written, the court granted a brief extension to the government, allowing it to file a response to the defense on April 14. In a two-page order filed earlier this month, the Ninth Circuit Court…
On Monday in Phoenix, U.S. District Court Judge Diane Humetewa vacated a Feb. 9 start date for the second trial of veteran newspapermen and former Backpage.com owners Michael Lacey and Jim Larkin, while a defense appeal on the issue of…
In a 17-page decision filed Dec. 29 in federal court in Phoenix, U.S. District Court Judge Diane Humetewa set the Lacey/Larkin case on track for a Feb. 9 retrial, rejecting a defense motion that the Constitution’s prohibition on double jeopardy…
In a 17-page order issued Dec. 10 in the Lacey/Larkin case, U.S. District Court Judge Diane Humetewa in Phoenix denied a defense motion requesting that the court release a fraction of the more than $135 million dollars seized by federal…
Defense attorneys in the Lacey/Larkin case faced a high bar during Friday’s oral arguments in Phoenix’s federal court on their motion for dismissal for double jeopardy, filed in the wake of a mistrial declared on Sep. 14 by Judge Susan…
In an eight-page order issued Friday, U.S. District Court Judge Diane Humetewa dismissed concerns by the defendants in the Lacey/Larkin case that her connections to the late Sen. John McCain and the McCain Institute might trigger her recusal due to…
Staring down the barrel of an expensive retrial triggered by intentional government overreach, defense attorneys in the Lacey/Larkin case are asking federal Judge Diane Humetewa to release a fraction of the millions of dollars in assets illegally seized by the…
