An Illinois pastor and former police chaplain has been charged in connection with efforts to intimidate Georgia election workers and a well-known attorney is taking the case.
“Many if not most of Georgia felony crimes have a basic two-year statue of limitations, and a RICO violation has a five-year statue of limitations, so they have to shoehorn into RICO things that would normally would have had the statue run because we are well over two years past Nov. 2020,” said David Shestokas.
David Shestokas is representing Rev. Stephen Cliffgard Lee. The indictment singles out Lee and alleges he and 18 others “unlawfully conspired and endeavored to conduct and participate in criminal enterprise in Fulton County, Georgia, and elsewhere.
Shestokas said the indictment is full (167 mentions) of references to “overt acts” but the RICO Act says that there has to be two “criminal acts” committed that further the criminal enterprise.
There’s 40 different “criminal actions” listed in the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act.
“They say it was an overt act in furtherance of a conspiracy,” said Shestokas.
Shestokas said the language in the indictment keeps referring to “overt acts” but that’s not what the Georgia RICO act says that makes you in violation.
Lee’s involvement revolves around his efforts to contact Georgia election worker Ruby Freeman in December 2020. Lee appeared at the election worker’s door roughly two weeks after Freeman and her daughter, Wandrea “Shaye” Moss, were accused by Trump of pulling fake ballots from suitcases in Georgia, with Trump suggesting they committed election fraud.
There’s a video that went viral and it appears Ruby Freeman ran the same ballots through the tabulator multiple times.
SMOKING GUN VOTER FRAUD This video gives a CLOSE UP of Ruby Freeman running the SAME BALLOTS through tabulator MULTIPLE TIMES.
Never Trumper Gabriel Sterling claimed that the tabulator didn’t read the stack the first time so had to be fed through twice! Yet @VoterGA found at… pic.twitter.com/Kfp33B5hfL
— Recall Katie Hobbs (@AmericanHubener) August 16, 2023
According to the indictment and Reuters’ reporting, Lee knocked on Freeman’s door, which Shestokas points out is not a criminal act.
“Knocking on a couple of doors and making a phone call are what his crimes are I suppose,” said Shestokas.
Freeman called the police. Police body cam footage uncovered last year by Reuters shows an officer approaching Lee’s car, at which point Lee identified himself as a faith leader.
“I’m a pastor, and I’m also working with some folks who are trying to help Ruby out — and also get to some truth of what’s going on,” said Lee in body cam video footage.
Lee served as a police officer in California and then as a police chaplain in New York City and he was also a NCIS special agent.
Shestokas said Lee is a pastor and he was hoping to provide some assistance to her as a faith leader and he didn’t do anything to intimate anyone.
“He didn’t even talk to anyone besides the officer,” said Shestokas. “The damage these people in Georgia are doing to the American legal system is incredible. They’re indicted the President’s lawyers for giving legal advice.”
Shestokas beat District Attorney Fani Willis before
An Illinois judge ruled in Nov. 2022 that District Attorney Fani Willis did not provide enough evidence to prove that an Illinois pastor needed to come testify as a witness before the grand jury.
“Pastor Lee was subpoenaed to testify by the special-purpose grand jury, but a subpoena issued by a state authority ends at the boundaries of the state. The state doesn’t have the authority to make somebody comply unless they get the cooperation of the state (in this case Illinois) of the residence of the person they want.
Lee lives in Kendall county, Illinois.
“We defeated Fani and her team in Kendall county,” said Shestokas. “The state of Georgia not only need the cooperation of the State of Illinois but they needed to follow the law in Illinois. We already beat them one time.”
Willis is facing backlash for alleged jury tampering after posting, on Monday, a document outlining charges against 2024 GOP frontrunner Donald Trump. The charges were posted by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis’ office briefly and deleted without explanation. The grand jury in charge of the case has yet to vote on the matter.
this document was posted online by the fulton county georgia DA’s office and then quickly taken down. defendant: donald trump pic.twitter.com/rv1jrbXp77
— jack queen (@jackqueen_) August 14, 2023
“There’s an argument to be made,” said Shestokas. “The process is that the prosecutors present evidence to the grand jury, then based on that evidence they draft charges and then ultimately the grand jury has the opportunity to vote up or down whether or not someone should be charged on those things. They did post those charges prior to the grand jury voting. The grand jury proceedings are secret and so we don’t have what happened timeline-wise within the grand jury itself. That will become available to defence counsel as time goes forward.”
Shestokas said at the very least someone breached the security and the sanctity of the grand jury when that posting took place, and whenever that happens– that calls into question the validity of the work of the grand jury.
Georgia’s RICO law was put on the books in 1981. It was modeled after the federal version Congress enacted to put away Mafia bosses who had traditionally evaded criminal prosecution by tying them to the actions of their underlings who carried out crimes on their behalf.
