Judge to Rule on Bid to End Hoover Trial

A federal judge will rule this morning on a defense request to dismiss the case or declare a mistrial because of alleged prosecutorial misconduct in the Nancy Hoover Hunter trial.

In an emergency hearing late Monday, attorney Robert Brewer asked U. S. District Judge Earl B. Gilliam to take action on “gross misconduct by the government.”

After hearing arguments for an hour, Gilliam took the matter under submission and said he will rule at 8:15 a.m. today.

Brewer said Assistant U. S. Atty. S. Gay Hugo handed over documents containing earlier statements made by the fourth prosecution witness, John Farrish, after Farrish finished testifying Friday and left the state.

Brewer asked Gilliam to do one of four things:

* Dismiss the 234-count fraud case against Hunter with prejudice, which means prosecutors would be barred from refiling against her.

* Declare a mistrial and begin a second trial.

* Have the witness’ entire testimony stricken from the record and order the jury not to consider what he said.

* Bring sanctions against Hugo.

“The government has withheld evidence from us, and they are doing everything they can to prevent the defendant from having a fair trial,” Brewer said.

Hugo responded to the charges by telling the judge: “I honestly thought it had been turned over.”

Co-prosecutor Stephen Clark said there are thousands of pages of documents in the case and that the earlier statements by Farrish were not discovered until recently.

Hunter, 50, is charged with fraud by a commodity broker, income tax evasion, conspiracy to defraud, mail fraud and making false statements to a federal agency in connection with the $80 million lost by 1,300 investors in the failed J. David & Co. investment firm.