WASHINGTON – Another federal judge in the nation's capital has blasted the Justice Department for filing federal felony charges it couldn't convince a grand jury to approve, this time in the case of a man accused of threatening to killPresident Donald Trump. The failure to secure an indictment is another setback for Trump's handpicked U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, formerFox News host Jeanine Pirro, whose office has repeatedly disproved the axiom that a grand jury will indict even a ham sandwich. "It's not fair to say they're losing credibility. We're past that now," U.S. Magistrate Judge Zia Faruqui said of Pirro's office and the broader Justice Department during a Sept. 4 hearing,the Associated Press reported. "There's no credibility left," Faruqui later said, according to the AP. Tim Lauer, a spokesman for Pirro, confirmed that the office has dismissed the felony charges against Edward Alexander Dana after the federal grand jury action and filed misdemeanor charges in Superior Court. Dana initially was charged with attempting "to make threats to do bodily harm to the President of the United States," an employee of Bar Japonais and a Metropolitan Police officer after breaking a light fixture at the DC bar on Aug. 17, court records show. It is at the latest of at least five cases in which DC grand juries have declined to indict people on felony charges brought by prosecutors in Pirro's office,according to media reportsand legal experts who have been tracking the cases. Pirro's office has saidit will charge aggressively as possible as part of Trump's crime crackdown in the District. In one especially high-profile case, prosecutors charged a DC man captured on videothrowing a sandwichat a federal agent with a misdemeanor offense afterfailing to convince a grand juryto return a more serious felony indictment against him. In another, a federal grand jury in DC refused to indict an Indiana woman accused of threatening to kill Trump. Nathalie Rose Jones, 50, of Lafayette, Indianawas arrested on Aug. 16in Washington on charges that she made death threats against Trump on social media and during an interview with Secret Service agents. More:Top Trump DOJ official spread false election claims as Fox News host but later reversed In Dana's case, he reportedly said he was drunk and that in the course of other rambling statements – including singing in the back of a patrol car and claiming to be in the Russian mafia – he vowed to fight fascism even if it meant killing a president,according to CBS News, citing court records. Dana was unarmed. Dana's attorney, assistant federal public defender Elizabeth Mullin, told the Associated Press that prosecutors should have known that his "hyperbolic rambling" didn't amount to a criminal threat. "A 15-year-old would know," Mullin said. "It was obvious from the outset." It is extraordinarily rare for a grand jury to refuse to return an indictment after prosecutors bring evidence and witnesses before them. According to Bureau of Justice Statistics datafrom 2010, only 11 out of about 162,000 federal cases were not indicted, which means grand juries issued a "no true bill" just 0.0068% of the time. That means grand juries went along with prosecutors' requests to indict in more than 99.99% of federal cases. "Threatening the life of the President is one of the most serious crimes and one that will be met with swift and unwavering prosecution. Make no mistake—justice will be served," Pirro said in an Aug. 18 news release. In Jones' case, Secret Service officials observed that Instagram user account "nath.jones" had posted threatening comments about the president of the United States from Aug. 2 to Aug. 9, the Justice Department said in the release. "The Instagram user called forPresident Trump's removal, labeled President Trump as a terrorist, referred to President Trump's administration as a dictatorship, and stated that President Trump had caused extreme and unnecessary loss of life in relation to the coronavirus," the DOJ said. But a grand jury refused to hand up an indictment on felony charges against Jones, her attorneysaid in a Sept. 2 court filing, the AP reported. Faruqui, a former federal prosecutor, has been critical of other failed felony indictments sought by Pirro. During the Sept. 4 hearing for Dana, he was furious with the prosecutor on the case – and with the U.S. Attorney's office and Justice Department,according to a CBS News reporterwho was in the room. The reporter, Scott MacFarlane, reported in a series of X posts that the judge said prosecutors owed Dana an apology for charging him and keeping him in custody for nearly a week. "We're acting like this is all normal,"MacFarlane quoted Faruquias saying. He also said the judge accused the Trump administration of "playing cops and robbers like children." "What's to prevent people from just getting rounded up off the streets?"the judge also asked, according to MacFarlane. The White House said Sept. 4 that more than 1,800 people have been arrested since Trump's anti-crime crackdown started Aug. 7. Over 40 cases have been filed in district court, which hears the most serious federal offenses, including assault, gun and drug charges. Contributing: Nick Penzenstadler This article originally appeared on USA TODAY:Judge blasts Trump DOJ after another DC grand jury refuses felony case
