No. of Recommendations: 1
For those who are interested, the indictment is here:
https://www.justice.gov/opa/media/1437146/dlFWIW, I think the wire fraud charges are the least supported. Basically, they appear to be premised on the SPLC's statements that they were working to dismantle hate groups, and argue that those statements were deceptive because the SPLC ended up paying informants for information and documents. I think that's going to be a heavy lift, once SPLC mounts a defense. They should be able to credibly argue that paying informants can be (and
were) understood to be part of their efforts to dismantle the hate groups, such that they believed their statements were correct and accurate.
The other charges, though, are more difficult. They relate to making false statements to banks and money laundering. DOJ is claiming that they gave false information to the banks about whose money it really was, including false affidavits relating to the ownership and/or operation of the business entities. I think that's going to be far more problematic for SPLC. They have a good faith argument for why they weren't deceiving donors when they said the funds would be used for dismantling hate groups, but I
don't see a readily apparent good faith argument that they weren't deceiving
the banks.
