EXCLUSIVE: A pro-police group will request the Justice Department investigate a Virginia prosecutor accused of being unfairly lenient to illegal immigrant suspects, using an oversight law the Biden administration used to scrutinize police departments like one in Kentucky after the Breonna Taylor incident.
The law enforcement “pattern-or-practice” provision, under 34 USC 12601, was previously used to investigate alleged civil rights violations during the Biden era by police departments — including in Louisville after a no-knock warrant was served, leading to a shootout that killed Taylor.
It has also been used against departments in New Jersey, Mississippi and Tennessee, as well as a division of the NYPD, for allegations ranging from excessive use of force, to gender bias and allegedly unlawful traffic stops.
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On Wednesday, the Law Enforcement Legal Defense Fund (LELDF) told Fox News Digital it would ask the Trump Justice Department to use the same law in a different respect to investigate progressive Fairfax County Commonwealth’s Attorney Steve Descano in Virginia.
Descano, who received at least $600,000 from a George Soros-funded political action committee during his first election bid in Virginia’s largest jurisdiction in 2019, came under fire recently for the nonprosecution of an illegal immigrant who allegedly murdered someone the day after he was released.
LELDF’s request “seeks to use established federal civil-rights tools to test whether a prosecutor’s office is operating a discriminatory system that endangers the public and erodes equal justice under law,” the group’s president, Jason C. Johnson told Fox News Digital. LELDF officials will formally ask Deputy Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon to investigate Descano’s office under the same “pattern-or-practice” concerns as Biden’s DOJ had in Louisville.
The group alleged the Fairfax Commonwealth’s Attorney’s Office “violat[ed] the civil rights of US citizens by favoring illegal aliens and non-citizens in charging, plea bargaining, and sentencing decisions.”
They cited Descano’s “official policy” to consider “immigration consequences” when prosecuting cases.
“As a federal prosecutor, Steve protected immigrants from criminals who targeted them due to their immigration status… Steve knows that regardless of immigration status, all our neighbors deserve equal protection of, and equal access to, the law,” a passage on Descano’s campaign page reads.
“The fear of law enforcement that Donald Trump has fostered in immigrant communities does nothing but lead to increased crime,” Descano claimed in backing up his policy.
“In addition to providing a safe place, Steve’s office will take immigration consequences into account when making charging and plea decisions. Although prosecutors typically refer to immigration consequences as ‘collateral consequences,’ avoiding the unnecessary destruction of families and communities will be a top priority for Steve as Commonwealth’s Attorney. Wherever possible, Steve will make charging and plea decisions that limit or avoid immigration consequences.”
That type of prosecutorial discretion runs afoul of the law, LELDF claimed in their letter to Dhillon.
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They pointed to the case of Marvin Morales-Ortez, who reportedly had first-degree murder charges stemming from a 2019 incident dropped by Descano’s office — which in turn told Washington’s ABC affiliate their evidence showed it was “clear that he was ultimately not the perpetrator who had killed Mr. [Jose] Guillen Mejia.”
Nick Minock, a reporter for the outlet, later obtained a transcript of Morales-Ortez’ preliminary hearing where Descano’s office posited that Morales-Ortez was present when Guillen Mejia was murdered and had ambushed the man on a walking path.
A short time after he was released, Morales-Ortez allegedly went to a home on Fan Shell Court in Reston, Va. — near John F. Dulles International Airport — and allegedly shot a man inside.
That chain of events enraged the Trump administration, with Assistant DHS Secretary Tricia McLaughlin saying that “Fairfax County politicians [who] push[ed] pushing policies that released this illegal alien from jail” have “blood on their hands.”
In the letter, LELDF argued that “dozens of illegal aliens like Morales-Ortez have repeatedly received excessive leniency from [Fairfax] under Commonwealth’s Attorney Steve Descano.”
They pointed directly to a passage in a 2020 memo from Descano laying out similar to his campaign page that “[Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorneys] shall consider immigration consequences where possible and where doing so accords with justice.”
LELDF claimed the memo and the policy it forwards directly violates the Constitution and denies U.S. citizens equal protection under the law versus illegal immigrants.
“It is both immoral and unlawful for a government agency to engage in systemic discrimination against U.S. citizens to the benefit of those illegally present,” the group told Dhillon.
The memo represents the necessary predicate for a federal investigation, they argued, while also taking issue with Fairfax’s “explicit policy directing prosecutors to weigh immigration consequences, including deportation’s ‘detrimental impact’ on families and communities, while ensuring no better outcomes than for non-immigrants.”
In a fuller excerpt from the memo, Descano says that when the seriousness of an offense and its harm is significant, the weight of “potential adverse immigration consequences” should be “minimal,” while the opposite is true for “less serious” offenses and those with “no identifiable victim.”
In those cases, subordinate prosecutors should “have greater latitude in negotiating a resolution that takes adverse immigration consequences into account.”
While his office did not respond to a request for comment, Descano has also bristled at the notion of being tied to Soros — recently hitting back at a top Youngkin administration official who blamed prosecutors linked to the Hungarian-American financier for the crime crisis.
“I’m not a ‘Soros funded prosecutor’, I’m the CA for Fairfax County – where the murder rate is 75% lower than the entire Commonwealth’s. Maybe [she] should look at the numbers (especially since she works in public safety) before making such a ridiculous claim,” Descano tweeted in 2022.
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