Embattled judge to face off with prosecutors
Federal court grants April showdown
Attorneys for embattled judge Shelley Joseph will get the chance to push to dismiss charges in the obstruction of justice case against her after a federal judge scheduled a hearing next month over objections by prosecutors.
The hearing, scheduled for April 2, is the latest in a lengthy battle with prosecutors over Joseph’s motion to dismiss, to access grand jury instructions and grand jury minutes.
Feds accuse Joseph, an Newton District Court judge, and retired court officer Wesley MacGregor of helping an illegal immigrant escape a courthouse to avoid an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent in 2018. Joseph has been on paid leave from her $184,000-a-year post since the state’s high court ruled last August to reinstate her salary during her suspension.
Calls to Joseph’s counsel was not returned Sunday.
Joseph’s attorneys have argued her and MacGregor’s cases need to be split because of MacGregor’s alleged perjury during grand jury testimony when he claimed he did not know ICE was in the courthouse waiting for the illegal immigrant.
“If the jury accepts a defendant Joseph contention that most, if not every employee in the Newton District Court knew ICE was there to pick up the non-citizen, the jury will necessarily convict the defendant MacGregor of perjury,” Joseph’s lawyers wrote in October. “Thus, severance will be required.”
Joseph also contests the grand jury instructions, alleging prosecutors didn’t tell the grand jurors about her suggested good faith defense of “judicial immunity,” meaning that the judge was in complete control of actions in her own courtroom. The issue of judicial immunity is also at the center of her motion to dismiss.
The judicial immunity defense was also a major part of Joseph’s defense in earning her salary back from the Supreme Judicial Court.
Prosecutors say Joseph conspired with the illegal immigrant’s defense attorney to have his client released and MacGregor allegedly accompanying the group downstairs toward the lockup and the courthouse’s back door.