Reservist loses bid to exclude wiretaps

WASHINGTON • A Maryland judge batted away a volley of motions Tuesday aimed at undermining the case against a former Canadian Forces reservist who allegedly hoped to trigger a race war in the United States.

Only two of the motions filed on behalf of alleged neo-Nazi Patrik Mathews — one to dismiss two of the four charges he faces, the other to suppress his statements — survived the day.

His lawyer, Joseph Balter, had hoped the court would agree to suppress a raft of wiretap, email and video evidence on the basis that investigators lacked sufficient probable cause to collect it.

Balter also argued that much of the “odious” hatefilled, anti-Semitic rhetoric Mathews can be heard using on various videos, recordings and online chats is protected by his right to free speech.

District Court Judge Theodore Chuang, however, disagreed.

“The primary argument offered by Mr. Mathews is that these discussions of racist views and ideology are protected by the First Amendment and should have been minimized,” Chuang said.

“That argument fails ... They provide evidence of intent to engage in hate crime, so those conversations were appropriately captured.”

Chuang rejected that request as well, insisting that the two cases are “properly joined” given that the charges the men face are intertwined and that any risk of prejudice can be dealt with at trial.

Mathews, a former combat engineer, vanished from Beausejour, Man., in 2019 following media reports alleging he was a recruiter for a white-supremacist group known as The Base.

He was arrested in January 2020 along with Lemley and William Bilbrough, as part of a broader FBI investigation of the group.