Probe of state lawmakers may last months
Simultaneous searches require careful planning
It could be months or years before the public learns the full extent of why federal agents searched multiple Tennessee Republican House members’ homes and state offices.
Nearly a dozen agents from the FBI entered the Cordell Hull legislative office building just before 8 a.m. on Jan. 8, collecting evidence while executing search warrants as part of an unspecified investigation. The searches came just days before the legislative session began.
“They’re not going to be in any hurry to disclose anything. It’s not in their interest to rush here,” said Steve Mulroy, a University of Memphis School of Law professor and former special assistant U.S. Attorney in Virginia.
“Across the board there are very sound institutional reasons to keep quiet about ongoing investigations until one is ready to either charge or decline to charge.”
The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Tennessee confirmed the FBI visited the homes of former House Speaker Glen Casada, R-franklin; Rep. Robin Smith, R-hixson; Rep. Todd Warner, R-chapel Hill; and former Casada aide Cade Cothren. They also went to a business associated with Warner. The agents descended on the homes around 7 a.m.
The FBI also searched the office of Rep. Kent Calfee, R-kingston, though House Speaker Cameron Sexton said he understood that Calfee “is not part of the investigation.” Calfee’s legislative assistant, however, has been placed on administrative leave in connection with the inquiry. Warner was just elected to the legislature this past fall, beating former Rep. Rick Tillis in an August Republican primary.
“It’s a pretty good guess that those who were on the receiving end of the search warrants are subjects of the investigation because those people are either their subjects or they believe for some reason that they wouldn’t cooperate with an investigation,” attorney Jerry Martin said.
Martin, now in private practice in Nashville, served as the U.S. Attorney for the Middle District of Tennessee under former President Barack Obama.
Surprise, early morning, simultaneous searches are relatively rare, and would have been months or years in the making.
“The obvious advantage of that is that you don’t want to tip off others that there is an investigation going on and give them time to conceal or destroy evidence,” Mulroy said. “You do want the element of surprise, with some of these searches.”
Coordinating the simultaneous searches requires a lot of agencies working in tandem to make sure things run smoothly. In order to approve the warrants and the need for them to run at the same time, investigators need to prove probable cause to a judge and work with multiple levels of the justice department, Martin said.
“It’s a huge undertaking to execute multiple warrants at one time, which is what they did the other day,” Martin said.
After all that, and the public scrutiny on this case, Martin thinks it unlikely the case won’t be put before a federal grand jury at some point down the road.
“I mean the idea that they’re just going to pack it up and say, ‘Oh, never mind,’ I would give that a 1% chance,” Martin said.
With the typical length of federal investigations, it could be months or years before the public hears anything from the feds about the case.
“These things take time,” Mulroy said. “In the meantime, the officials involved may, you know, decide that it’s in their interest to explain themselves to the public, or not.”
Other Tennessee lawmakers under federal scrutiny show these investigations can last years.
The Department of Justice has continued an investigation of expelled former Rep. Jeremy Durham as recently as January 2020 in a case that started at least as long ago as August 2016.
And he’s not alone, keeping company with Sen. Brian Kelsey, R-germantown, and former state Senator and Rutherford County Mayor Bill Ketron.
“It’s a big deal when you have elected officials that are the subject of a federal investigation or are responding to search warrants in the wee hours of the morning,” Martin said. “It’s cyclical. About every 10 years a number of members of the Tennessee legislature are charged with federal crimes.
“If you look at other states and other capitals, they seem to be plagued with this problem, too,” he said. “You give somebody a little bit of power, and it goes to their head and they make bad decisions.”
Federal investigators are notoriously reticent about ongoing cases, but it’s possible the public nature of the searches could prompt a rare acknowledgement if the case is dropped — itself an unlikely eventuality, both attorneys said.
“You had elected officials in their bathrobes all over the media, with a report of search warrants being executed,” Martin said. “It turns out the government packs it up and goes home and didn’t find anything? If their lawyer is demanding some kind of announcement that the investigation is closed, I think the government might at least consider that.”
Natalie Allison contributed.
Reach reporter Mariah Timms at mtimms@tennessean.com or 615-2598344 and on Twitter @Mariahtimms.