A federal judge has declined the request made by the Department of Justice to hold the office of former President Donald Trump in contempt for failing to comply with a grand jury subpoena. This case relates to the request to return classified documents to the National Archives.
According to an NBC report, U.S. District Judge Beryl A. Howell for the District of Columbia has denied the DOJ’s request after the closed hearing on Friday. The hearing took around 90 minutes, and there were no news outlets present. However, reporters did spot the different attorneys as they entered and exited the courtroom.
The Washington Post report noted that the federal prosecutors were specifically looking to file a contempt charge for Trump’s office after there were two more “classified”
documents found in a storage unit, not far from Mar-a-Lago.
In August the FBI also raided Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Estate and recovered 103 classified documents that should have been returned to the National Archives in January 2021, after Trump had left office.
The raid eventually led to the appointment of special counsel Jack Smith by Attorney General Merrick Garland. Smith is now probing into the case of the classified documents as well as being involved in the investigation on the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol insurrection.
