A federal prosecutor involved in the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas case has reportedly withdrawn citing “security reasons.”
Assistant U.S. attorney Jay Hileman emailed defense attorneys Tuesday, informing them he was leaving the case, two of the lawyers who received the emails said.
"He sent the email to every lawyer representing a defendant in the Aryan Brotherhood federal case, and he said — very short email — that he was withdrawing for security reasons,"
Katherine Scardino, a lawyer for one of the defendants, told Talking Points Memo.
The U.S. Attorney’s office for the Southern District of Texas would not confirm to news outlets that Hileman had quit the case. It issued a statement saying, "The case currently pending in the Southern District of Texas has been and will continue to be worked by the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Texas in partnership with the Department of Justice’s Criminal Division.”
Defense attorney Richard O. Ely II, who is representing another of the defendants,
told The Dallas Morning News that Hileman is likely concerned about his family after the killing of the Kaufman County, Texas, district attorney and his wife this past weekend.
“He’s obviously made a decision based on something,” Ely said.
The assistant district attorney of Kaufman County was shot to death in January.
No official connection has been made between the Kaufman County shootings case and the white supremacist group, but investigators are focusing their efforts in that direction.
Four of the group’s leaders were indicted in October of 2012, and in December a bulletin was issued that the supremecists might attempt to harm law enforcement officials in retaliation for the probe that also nabbed 30 more of its members.
The group was founded in the Texas prison system in the 1980s and now has members inside and outside prison. It is known for killings, kidnappings, and prostitution.
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