US Attorney’s Office ‘Losing the Trust’ of the Public – Update for March 24, 2026

We post news and comment on federal criminal justice issues, focused primarily on trial and post-conviction matters, legislative initiatives, and sentencing issues.

‘PANTS ON FIRE,’ FEDERAL JUDGE TELLS AUSA

A remarkable exchange occurred last week in a New Jersey courtroom.

Judge Zahid Quraishi was irate that a US Attorney’s Office made a sweetheart plea deal with a child porn defendant before discovering that he possessed a lot more porn of a much more disgusting nature than the government knew when it negotiated the plea agreement. As a result, the plea agreement allowed for a sentence that would max out at about a third of what the advisory guideline sentencing range turned out to be.

Back to Judge Quraishi: The Judge is the first Muslim to serve as a federal district judge. And he’s hardly the poster child for the “radical left lunatic” judges that President Trump regularly rails against. As an Army captain in the Judge Advocate General’s corps, Judge Quiraishi served in Iraq. Unusual for an Army lawyer, he was awarded a combat action badge, which suggests not only that he never had bone spurs, but that he “actively engag[ed] or [was] engaged by the enemy, and perform[ed] satisfactorily in accordance with prescribed rules of engagement.” Such as being shot at.

In civilian life, the Judge served as a lawyer for Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, as an Assistant US Attorney in the US Attorney’s Office for the District of New Jersey, and then as a US Magistrate Judge. In his spare time, Judge Quraishi taught courses on trial presentation at Rutgers Law School.

The Judge presumably knows his stuff, especially where the proper functioning of the US Attorney’s Office is concerned.

Previously, Judge Matthew Brann (Middle District of Pennsylvania, who brought into New Jersey to hear challenges to the US Attorney’s Office) had ruled that the US Attorney’s office was operating illegally after parking lot lawyer Alina Habba, Trump’s former personal lawyer, had been thrown out of office as US Attorney. Attorney General Pam Bondi appointed a triumvirate of attorneys to run the office in her place. Judge Brann found that appointment illegal, too.

Concerned about Judge Brann’s holding, Judge Quraishi – already furious that the US Attorney’s sloppy plea deal meant that he could not hammer Villafane with a sentence in excess of a half century – demanded that the AUSA be ready to answer questions at the sentencing hearing about who was running things. But the AUSA was able to offer only blandishments not based on personal knowledge, sort of what you might get if you asked a soldier in the trenches who was really managing the war effort back in Washington.

The AUSA’s equivocal answers caused the Judge to demand that the three acting heads of the office appear to testify. Exasperated, the Judge told the AUSA:

What you’ve told me today, what your representation is, which I don’t believe, by the way. I won’t believe it until you testify. That is what has happened to the credibility of your office. Generations of Assistant U.S. Attorneys had built the goodwill of that office for your generation to destroy it within a year.

The extraordinary rebuke came after the Judge told courtroom security officers to remove a supervisory AUSA from the courtroom because he hadn’t filed a notice of appearance and he just wouldn’t shut up. (In an in-your-face response, the AUSA – Mark Coyne, head of the Office’s Appellate Division – filed a notice of appearance the next day).

A DOJ spokesman said, “Unfortunately some judges are more interested in courtroom theatrics and constitutional overreach than promoting public safety. It is an especially troubling moment when a court chooses to sideline a case involving child exploitation.” This disingenuous criticism – the judge is angry that a US Attorney error prevents him from sentencing the defendant to a sentence three times longer than the deal the plea agreement includes – will probably only fan the flames.

So much for the presumption of regularity that US Attorneys have enjoyed from the courts for over 225 years.  As Judge Quirashi put it to the AUSA, ““You have lost the confidence and the trust of this court. You have lost the confidence and the trust of the New Jersey legal community, and you are losing the trust and confidence of the public.”

A final note: Yesterday, the New Jersey federal judges appointed a new interim US attorney, Robert Frazer, “a career prosecutor who federal court veterans said could bring some stability to an office that has been in chaos for much of the past year,” according to The New York Times.

According to a court filing, the Times said, Frazer’s appointment came after consultations between district court judges and the DOJ’s senior leadership.  Justice officials “reportedly welcomed his selection. That response itself represented a shift; other U.S. attorneys appointed by judges around the country during President Trump’s second term have been fired.”

Transcript, Doc 36, United States v. Villafane, Case No. 3:25-cr-00232 (March 16, 2026)

New York Times, Judge Ejects Federal Prosecutor From Court and Orders Bosses to Testify (March 17, 2026)

~ Thomas L. Root