On Thursday, a federal judge heard two hours of oral argument over the question of whether prosecutors’ accusations against two senior Boston City Hall aides are sufficient to warrant going forward with criminal extortion charges.
City tourism director Kenneth Brissette and Intergovernmental Affairs director Timothy Sullivan – both appointed as senior aides by Boston Mayor Marty Walsh, and both now suspended – have each been charged with extortion for allegedly using their influence to improperly pressure the organizers of the Boston Calling music festival to hire union labor.
Both men have pleaded not guilty.
But the question before Judge Leo Sorokin in this week’s hearing was not one of guilt or innocence of the alleged criminal activity – but whether the very activity prosecutors describe would constitute criminal extortion in the first place.
Lawyers for the defendants have argued, in a joint motion to dismiss the case before it goes to trial, that the prosecution’s own version of events doesn’t show extortion — largely because prosecutors never asserted that Brissette or Sullivan obtained, or even tried to obtain, money or other tangible benefits or property for themselves.
Prosecutors counter that Brissette and Sullivan conspired to improperly obtain wages and benefits for the union members and, in the process, to advance their own careers via the alleged extortion.
But defense lawyers told Judge Sorokin that the United States Supreme Court has held, notably in its 2013 decision in Sekhar v. United States, that the federal Hobbes Act under which the men are being prosecuted, applies only to cases in which the alleged criminal has used threats or intimidation to obtain “property,” and that the allegations against Brissette and Sullivan do not paint such a picture.
Attorney Sarah E. Silva, who is representing Brissette, said that the defense was not aware of a single example in case law of a successful prosecution under the Hobbes Act that did not involve an allegation of direct tangible benefit.
Judge Sorokin, who said he will deliberate before ruling on the motion, spent considerable time critiquing aspects of both parties’ arguments.
At times he seemed dubious of whether the prosecution’s case really did describe the kind of crime being alleged; but Sorokin also repeatedly questioned defense lawyers as to why they are asking him to rule on the matter rather than let a jury decide.
