'Broadview Six' prosecutor asks judge to delay high-stakes hearing where feds could take the stand
A prosecutor who's been ordered to testify about the tainted “Broadview Six” case asked a judge Thursday to delay the hearing by a week, citing the possibility that his interests "may not be aligned" with others called to the stand — a list that includes U.S. Attorney Andrew Boutros.
Assistant U.S. Attorney William Hogan asked U.S. District Judge April Perry to push the Nov. 16 hearing back to Nov. 23.
He did so in a five-page brief filed by his attorney, Shelly Kulwin. It said Kulwin will be out of town before Nov. 16, and he will need "several days" to meet with Hogan and prepare for the hearing.
Hogan also asked Perry to clarify how the hearing will move forward, questioning whether his attorney will be allowed to cross-examine witnesses.
"While AUSA Hogan is unaware of the position the government may take at the upcoming hearing or the possible testimony of any other [assistant U.S. attorney] (or the United States attorney), it is quite possible that the government's interests, as well as some of the other proposed witnesses' testimony, 'may not be aligned' with his," Kulwin wrote in the court filing.
Perry earlier this week ordered Boutros, Hogan and two other rank-and-file prosecutors to testify in her courtroom. She did so while grappling with allegations of prosecutorial misconduct, which doomed the case filed last year against six Operation Midway Blitz protesters.
Perry has specifically said Boutros' statements about the case are "hard to credit" and "nearly unfathomable."
Boutros is also being sued by Douglas DePodesta, the former special agent in charge of the FBI in Chicago. His lawsuit alleges that Boutros chased political prosecutions at the behest of President Donald Trump. Then, after the "Broadview Six" case fell apart, Boutros allegedly blamed DePodesta, falsely, for its failure within the Justice Department.
DePodesta said he was forced to resign.
Boutros has previously denied that politics drove charging decisions in his office. The Justice Department has declined to comment on the pending litigation.
The "Broadview Six" case revolved around a protest outside an immigration holding facility in west suburban Broadview in September 2025. Prosecutors alleged that a crowd pushed and damaged a federal agent’s SUV.
But from that crowd, only six people were charged with a conspiracy to impede the agent. Most of them were involved in local Democratic politics, raising questions about selective prosecution.
The defendants were then-congressional candidate Kat Abughazaleh, Oak Park village trustee Brian Straw, then-Cook County Board candidate Catherine “Cat” Sharp, 45th Ward Democratic committeeperson Michael Rabbitt, musician Joselyn Walsh and Abughazaleh campaign worker Andre Martin.
The case collapsed May 21 after Perry discovered alleged misconduct by the onetime lead prosecutor in the case, Sheri Mecklenburg.
Hogan, a veteran federal prosecutor in Chicago, took over the "Broadview Six" case after Mecklenburg withdrew from it in February. Mecklenburg allegedly committed misconduct while seeking an indictment from a grand jury — including speaking to grand jurors outside the grand jury room.
But her alleged wrongdoing had also been redacted out of transcripts given to the judge in April — a fact that Perry has said she found "most problematic."
Hogan has taken responsibility for redacting them. He did so the day the case collapsed.
Hogan is no stranger to controversy. In fact, claims of misdeeds during the prosecution of El Rukn street gang cases in the 1980s and 1990s led to Hogan's firing in 1996. He was rehired after an administrative judge cleared him of wrongdoing, according to previous reports in the Chicago Sun-Times.
He's continued to work as a prosecutor at the Dirksen Federal Courthouse, even as Boutros' office grappled with a credibility crisis created by the "Broadview Six" scandal.
Perry concluded last month that further “under oath” fact-finding was needed in the case. She told lawyers Oct. 1 that, “my sole focus, at this point, is on lack of candor, concealment of material facts, or other misconduct that occurred before me.”
Days later, she asked Boutros’ office to provide records that could shed light on whether the feds were telling the truth when they made specific claims in the case last spring. She asked the feds to turn the records over by Oct. 30.
Instead, Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward, the third-highest ranking official in the Justice Department, inserted himself into the case that day. He asked Perry to clarify the point of her inquiry and told her she should make clear if her “request” for documents was really a “directive.”
Woodward also warned her that “the United States has not agreed to provide any information” she’d sought.
Perry responded with a seven-page order that made clear she wasn’t pleased with Woodward. She complained that the timing of his filing “could easily lead one to conclude that the goal of the filing was not to cure genuine confusion … but instead to inject unnecessary delay into these proceedings.”
However, she has now given the feds until Monday to turn over the records.
How the “Broadview Six” case collapsed and created a credibility crisis
April 7, 2025: Andrew Boutros, a former rank-and-file federal prosecutor in Chicago, is appointed on a temporary basis to act as the city’s U.S. Attorney. The four-month appointment is made by then-Attorney General Pam Bondi.
July 24, 2025: With Bondi’s temporary appointment set to expire, Chicago’s federal judges choose Boutros to continue as U.S. Attorney on a more permanent basis.
Oct. 23, 2025: Boutros’ office secures a conspiracy indictment against a group of Operation Midway Blitz protesters who would come to be known as the “Broadview Six.” Most of the six defendants are involved in local Democratic politics, raising questions about selective prosecution.
April 7: In an interview published to mark his first year in office, Boutros denies that politics played any role in his office’s charging decisions: “[There is] not a single case, OK, involving politics in our decision-making. Full stop. Period. Zero. And anyone who says otherwise is misstating reality. And anyone who says otherwise is an armchair expert who doesn’t know what they’re talking about. Period.”
April 29: Boutros’ office drops the conspiracy indictment in the “Broadview Six” case and says it will move forward with misdemeanor charges against four remaining defendants. The move sparks suspicion among defense attorneys because prosecutors had been asked to give U.S. District Judge April Perry unredacted transcripts of the grand jury proceedings. The judge initially decided there was no longer a need to review them because prosecutors dropped the grand jury’s indictment.
May 21: Having finally reviewed the unredacted grand jury transcripts at the urging of defense attorneys, Perry reveals that she was “incredibly shocked” to find that they documented alleged misconduct by Boutros’ staff. Boutros appears in court to personally drop the charges against the remaining four members of the “Broadview Six.” Boutros also assures Perry that he didn’t know about certain misconduct by his staff until late April 2026.
July 1-2: News breaks that Chicago FBI boss Douglas DePodesta would be leaving his job unexpectedly. An FBI social media account responds to news of his departure with the message, “Anyone who is not on board with THIS FBI under the leadership of President Trump … is free to leave.” Boutros tells reporters that DePodesta’s departure “was news to me.” DePodesta’s sister-in-law is a defense attorney representing a member of the “Broadview Six.”
July 9: Following weeks of bad headlines generated by the “Broadview Six” controversy, Boutros is ordered into court by U.S. Magistrate Judge Laura McNally, who concludes that a secrecy order she’d entered in a separate case was violated by a Washington press conference Boutros participated in July 1 with then-Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and FBI Director Kash Patel.
Aug. 4: Boutros files a brief in the “Broadview Six” case acknowledging that, in October 2025, he’d received by email a grand jury transcript that documented alleged wrongdoing by his staff — the same misconduct he’d told Perry he was unaware of until April. Boutros says he doesn’t remember reading it.
Nov. 2: DePodesta sues Boutros, alleging Boutros falsely told his superiors that DePodesta and his sister-in-law conspired to destroy the “Broadview Six” case, and that DePodesta was eventually forced to resign. Separately, Perry issues a seven-page order finding that Boutros’ claims were “hard to credit” and “nearly unfathomable.” She orders Boutros and others to appear in court to testify about the “Broadview Six” case on Nov. 16.
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