This just in from the Grand Junction Sentinel’s Charles Ashby, just days before her trial on a range of felony and other criminal counts related to the theft of election system data in her charge in a failed attempt to prove the 2020 presidential election was stolen from Donald Trump, ex-Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters has fired her second set of attorneys and as a result once again successfully delayed her rendezvous with the criminal justice system:
Appearing before District Judge Matthew Barrett in a last-minute review hearing on Tuesday, former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters fired her second set of attorneys, hired new ones and got her trial delayed again.
That eight-day criminal trial, on charges of identity theft and misconduct in office, had been set to start Friday.
Granting Peters’ third legal team the necessary time to prepare for trial means it will be July before trial begins, giving Peters’ “prayer warriors” more months to pray Peters’ guilt away, for MAGA cops to press their dress uniforms before showing up in court to support identity theft, and above all more time for Peters to raise money and be feted as a martyr-to-be by supporters of the presumptive Republican presidential nominee. We don’t know the stated reason given by Peters for firing her lawyers, but given that Peters’ legal strategy up to now has consisted of increasingly improbable delay tactics, the further delay afforded by firing her lawyers is an end unto itself.
Or…maybe Peters’ lawyer told her what we’ve been saying for over a year, which is that this is not a case Peters can expect to win, and it’s time to take whatever deal might yet be available. With Peters having freely admitted to the basic facts in her failed claim to be a “whistleblower” and Peters’ own deputies lined up to testify against her, we’re well past the point that smart attorneys start looking for the cleanest possible exit for their clients.
What remains is the possibility that Tina Peters is not listening to anyone, and is stalling for intervention–divine, revolutionary, anything she can imagine. Whatever it takes to hold off justice a little while longer. All the while increasing the expense to taxpayers over this whole folly, and taking fellow Republicans’ eyes off the ball ahead of the next election.
There are no winners here, but the list of losers is growing to include almost everyone except Tina Peters. Until the case is settled in a court of law, the ambiguity also helps Trump.
That’s about it. Everyone else pays the price.
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Give it time. I don't foresee another continuance to switch counsel. Though frustrating, it appears the district court is making a solid record to blunt any future claims of ineffective assistance of counsel. Frustrating, but the conviction is still likely to happen.
She's just going to keep switching out teams of lawyers indefinitely to delay the trial. Stay tuned, she's going to go though tons of them until Trump reseizes power and pardons her. Frankly I can see him eventually taking the same tactic himself.
Even if Donald Trump somehow got reelected, how could he pardon somebody convected of a crime in a Colorado state court?
My mistake, I assumed they were federal and not state charges.
She would probably ask him to do so, and he would issue something in writing purporting to be a pardon.
While it would have no legal effect since she faced state charges, the MAGAts would claim it is valid in much the same way that they claim that Biden's election was invalid.
I don't see the judge letting her do it again. At some point, the court will be able to present her with "go to trial with this counsel, or go to trial without counsel." But the court needs to create a good record justifying that drastic step. Based on my reading of everything to date, I think the court has done that and that this case will go to trial at the end of July.
If the judge were to revoke her bail, perhaps she could be convinced to stop stalling.
Duke, that often is an incentive for a defendant to go to trial.
And with Tina and her penchant for doing whatever the hell she wants to do when she wants to do it and how she chooses to do it – regardless of the terms of her bond – there is a t least a real possibility that she will have her bond revoked at some point and put in jail.
I am so tired of the stalling. I hope any further stalls result in bond being revoked.
C-word
And it is not a term of endearment
Excellent open letter to Dave Williams from election experts from the sane wing of the Republican Party.
"We expect better from the leadership of the Colorado Republican Party," REALLY? Are they fucking blind?
I'm pretty sure they don't expect Dave Williams (and most MAGAts) to read it, much less act on it. They wrote it for a broader audience to signal that not every current or former Republican in a position of authority is nuts, and that they can trust our elections, and not to fall for Williams' nonsense.
I don' doubt that was the point however sending it to the Colorado Republican Party is a worthless gesture. Unless they plan on running that "Open Call" in every newspaper, on t.v, internet, hell…mailer…the message was kinda useless. As you said, Williams and the MAGATs aren't going to read it and if they do they'll blow it off. They're in charge. They don't give a shit. If the open call people want to reach the actual people who vote, doing it through the CRP is not the way.
It was an OP-ED in today’s Denver Post. The link is included in my initial comment