FBI agents raid home as death threats target Whitmer kidnap case judge, lawyers

HAZEL PARK, Mich. — FBI agents have raided a Hazel Park home while investigating threats to the judge and defense lawyers in the Gov. Gretchen Whitmer kidnapping conspiracy trial, The Detroit News has learned.

Agents are investigating threats directed at several people, including Chief U.S. District Judge Robert Jonker and defense lawyers Josh Blanchard and Christopher Gibbons, according to two sources familiar with the investigation who were not authorized to speak publicly about the probe. Jonker is presiding over the trial and the attorneys represent accused plot ringleaders Barry Croft and Adam Fox, respectively.

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The raid raises questions about the security of key figures in one of the country’s most important prosecutions involving politics, allegations of domestic terrorism and violent extremism. Prosecutors say the defendants were angered by restrictions imposed by Whitmer in the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, but defense lawyers say there was no plot and that FBI agents and informants orchestrated the case.

“Unfortunately, it’s become far too common a thing in society today,” said Detroit defense attorney Michael Bullotta, a former federal prosecutor. “It comes with the territory in a high-profile case.”

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The shooting was unrelated to Berg’s job or his earlier career as a federal prosecutor. Detroit resident Kevin Andre Smith Jr. was acquitted of shooting Berg but convicted of robbery conspiracy and gun charges, and sentenced to 67 to 90 years in prison.

The ongoing investigation involving Whitmer trial figures coincides with an increase in the number of threats to federal judges in recent years fueled by a rise in domestic extremism. In February, the head of the U.S. Marshals Service said federal judges were targeted in more than 4,500 threats and inappropriate communications in 2021, according to a Reuters report.

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Before the trial started March 8, prosecutors expressed concern about outside influence and singled out supporters of Croft. In a jailhouse phone call, Croft appeared as a guest on a podcast during which one of the hosts talked about influencing jurors.

“My thinking was to have the militia at the courthouse, and do a big recruitment, and do it right there at the courthouse,” the host said, according to a government court filing. “For the juries. Jury nullification! Jury nullification! Jury nullification!”

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