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Case 1:19-cr-00830-AT Document 22 Filed 01/28/20 Page 2 of 3

January 28, 2020
Page 2

Government also produced 3500 material for every individual interviewed during the investigation in December, nearly four months in advance of trial.

"Whether or not to adjourn a trial date is traditionally within the discretion of the trial judge." United States v. Scopo, 861 F.2d 339, 344 (2d Cir. 1988) (internal quotations omitted). While there "is no mechanical test with respect to requests for a continuance or adjournment," United States v. Al Fawaaz, 116 F. Supp. 3d 194, 210 (S.D.N.Y. 2015), the Second Circuit has identified certain circumstances in which an adjournment may be appropriate: (1) the requested delay is of a short (or at least fixed duration); (2) the sought-after evidence is specified with particularity; (3) the proposed evidence is critical to the defense; and (4) the defendant has not been dilatory. Id. at 211 (summarizing considerations found in United States v. White, 324 F.3d 814, 814-16 (2d Cir. 1963)).

None of the circumstances identified in Al Fawaaz necessitate the lengthy adjournment requested by the defendants. The Government’s case-in-chief turns on a brief, fourteen-hour window for which the evidence is limited and now available to the defendants. Moreover, even as expanded to include all of the additional material produced as described above, the discovery in the instant case is neither unusually voluminous nor complex, and the defendants provide no specific reasons why the review of the materials requires a six-month adjournment.

Nor does the need to file pre-trial motions and interview witnesses support such an adjournment. Thomas’s counsel has indicated that he intends to file a motion to dismiss the indictment, while Noel’s counsel states that he has not been able to determine what motions to file pending his review of the discovery. Noel’s counsel, however, identifies no reason to believe such a review is likely to result in the identification of any potential pre-trial motions: as counsel is aware, the Government did not obtain any search warrants as part of its investigation, nor did the defendants make post-arrest statements that the Government would seek to introduce into evidence. As such, there is no evidence for the defendants to seek to suppress. As for the motion to dismiss, which does not depend on a review of the discovery, counsel for Thomas identifies no reason why such a motion could not be made in short order.

Finally, with respect to the need to interview witnesses, as noted above, the Government has already produced all of the witness statements in its possession, almost all of them on December 31, 2019, nearly four months before trial. As the Court is well-aware, such productions of witness statements are typically made only weeks before trial is scheduled to begin. As such, the Government’s early production of those materials—giving the defendants months of additional time to review those statements and take any potential investigation steps based upon them—cannot possibly merit a lengthy postponement of the trial date.

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