Former Agent’s Convictions Tossed by Appeals Court After SCOTUS Jan. 6 Ruling

The U.S. Capitol building in Washington on Oct. 7, 2024. Madalina Vasiliu/The Epoch Times

A federal appeals court has thrown out obstruction convictions for a former Naval Criminal Investigative Service agent who gave information to a suspected terrorist with whom she became romantically involved.

The U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision in a case involving the Jan. 6, 2021, breach of the U.S. Capitol means the convictions against former agent Leatrice De Bruhl-Daniels must be tossed, according to an Oct. 11 ruling from a U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit panel.

The three counts brought under the statute charged De Bruhl with obstruction for telling Nadal Diya, a Syrian man suspected of being a terrorist, that he was under investigation by the FBI, that he would be arrested if he went to the United States, and that his business associate was also being investigated.

The statute bars corruptly altering, destroying, mutilating, or concealing a record, document, or other object with the intent to impair an official proceeding. It also enables charges to be brought against a person who “otherwise obstructs, influences, or impedes any official proceeding, or attempts to do so.”

The Supreme Court ruled in June in a Jan. 6 case that the second part of the law, starting with otherwise, still requires prosecutors to establish that a person impaired or attempted to impair an item used in an official proceeding. The case was Fischer v. United States.

De Bruhl was convicted of impairing “witness testimony and intangible information” by tipping off Diya. But prosecutors did not provide evidence that the information she relayed impaired a proceeding, the appeals court judges said in the new ruling.

“Conjecture that a tipped-off target could destroy evidence is not sufficient to show evidence impairment,” U.S. Circuit Judge Cory Wilson wrote for the unanimous panel.

Prosecutors posited that De Bruhl’s warning Diya led to the FBI being unable to search his electronic devices because he was ultimately arrested in Canada.

“But this is no less speculative than the Government’s other assertions, particularly considering that Diya’s visa application was denied, such that he would not have been allowed entry into the United States regardless of De Bruhl’s telling him so,” Wilson said.

U.S. Circuit Judges Edith Jones and Edith Brown Clement joined the decision.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Texas, which prosecuted De Bruhl, did not respond to a request for comment.

Attorneys for De Bruhl could not be reached.

The ruling vacated the three obstruction counts but left intact the other nine counts of which De Bruhl was convicted. It remanded the case back to the district court level for resentencing.