Judge holds prosecutor of accused Charlie Kirk assassin in contempt

A Utah county judge ruled on Friday that an attorney involved in prosecuting Charlie Kirk’s alleged assassin violated the case’s pretrial gag order with comments he made while speaking with reporters. Utah Deputy County Attorney Christopher Ballard made comments to media outlets regarding the strength of the case’s evidence against accused shooter Tyler Robinson and was found in civil contempt of court, Utah Fourth District Court Judge Tony Graf said during Friday’s virtual hearing. 

What kind of comments? Ballard previously argued that his comments to the media were made to correct misinformation about a preliminary ballistics finding. Investigators determined a bullet fragment found at the crime scene could not conclusively be matched to the gun Robinson allegedly used. As a result, several media outlets falsely reported that the investigation ruled that the bullet fragment was not a match to the weapon. Ballard told media outlets that the inconclusive finding meant that investigators were unable to determine whether the fragment was a match—not that a match was ruled out. Judge Graf found that statements by Ballard correcting this information in and of themselves did not constitute contempt, but further statements by Ballard on the strength of the prosecution’s case did.

What does this mean for the case? Defense attorneys representing Robinson requested remedial measures against any damage of Ballard’s comments caused by prejudicing locals. Robinson’s team argued that the death penalty should be removed from the case to compensate for Ballard’s possible tainting of the pool of potential jurors.

How did the judge respond? Graf agreed that measures would be taken to remedy damage from Ballard’s breaking of the gag order, but declined the defense’s request to take the death penalty off the table. Striking the death penalty is grossly disproportionate to Ballard’s misconduct, and outside the legal framework of civil contempt, the judge explained. Graf ordered additional jury questionnaires and for the jury summons to be expanded as an initial remedy for the misconduct. The prosecution must also reimburse the defence team for the fees and filing charges associated with the contempt procedures, Graf added.