Crime & Law
‘Broadview Six’ File Motion to Recoup Legal Expenses After Botched Prosecution
Former congressional candidate Kat Abughazaleh, left, is seen along with a crowd around a vehicle on Sept. 26, 2025, outside the Broadview ICE facility. (Credit: Kat Abughazaleh)
Attorneys for the former “Broadview Six” defendants are taking new steps toward potential sanctions after federal prosecutors were accused of covering up their own alleged misconduct before the grand jury that indicted the case last fall.
Defense attorneys on Tuesday filed claims under the Hyde Amendment, through which they’ll seek to recoup attorneys’ fees for the now-former defendants, days after Chicago’s U.S. Attorney Andrew Boutros announced his office had dismissed all charges in the controversial case.
“We will use every available tool to ensure that the public knows exactly what happened in this case, who within the Department of Justice knew about the prosecutorial misconduct that led to this sham political indictment, and when they knew it,” Chris Parente, a defense attorney representing Oak Park Village Board Trustee Brian Straw, said in a statement.
Boutros appeared before U.S. District Judge April Perry last month to apologize for his prosecutors’ conduct and announce that his office would be dismissing all charges against the remaining Broadview defendants — Straw, former 9th District congressional candidate Kat Abughazaleh, her campaign staffer Andre Martin and Democratic Committeeperson Michael Rabbitt.
That came after grand jury transcripts revealed allegations of significant prosecutorial misconduct that occurred in front of multiple grand juries as Boutros’ office sought charges in this case.
Those transcripts have not yet been released publicly, though they are expected to be unsealed in the coming weeks. Whatever happened during those secret proceedings led to defense attorneys accusing prosecutors of a “scandal” and a cover up and Perry saying her trust in the prosecutors handling the case had been “broken.”
“This wide-ranging misconduct, both outside of and before the Court, cast serious doubts on the government’s prior representations, including the lack of any outside influence and direction from Washington D.C. in bringing these charges, which raises concerns beyond the problematic presentation of the case to the grand jury and subsequent cover-up,” defense attorneys wrote in their motion. “The law provides a remedy for those, like Defendants here, who are subject to this type of vexatious, bad faith, and frivolous litigation."
Abughazaleh said she and her codefendants owe hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees fighting against the charges in this case. She and Martin have launched a GoFundMe campaign that has raised more than $246,000 as of Tuesday.
The former defendants had also considered filing a claim under the Department of Justice’s new $1.776 billion “anti-weaponization fund,” which was launched this month to compensate those who believe they were unjustly prosecuted due to political reasons.
But it now appears plans for that fund have been scrapped after a federal judge blocked any potential payouts.
“If you want an example of weaponization, you have prosecutors going into the grand jury targeting political candidates and political figures improperly,” Straw’s defense attorney Chris Parente said last month. “These guys should be exhibit one to get part of this DOJ weaponization fund.”
Immediately after the charges were dismissed, defense attorneys made clear they planned to seek sanctions against the U.S. Attorney’s Office and prosecutors involved in the case — assistant U.S. attorneys William Hogan, Matthew Skiba, Andres Almendarez and Sheri Mecklenburg.
Even Perry noted during a closed-door meeting with attorneys that there was the “potential here … on sanctions for prosecutorial misconduct and for potential ethical violations, including lack of candor to the Court.”
Mecklenburg, who had served as lead prosecutor on the case, had previously bowed out to take up a role with the Senate Judiciary Committee under U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin. She was terminated from that role after the revelations in the Broadview case.
None of the other three — Hogan, Skiba and Almendarez — were present at the latest hearing in this case Tuesday, where they were replaced by veteran Assistant U.S. Attorney Diane MacArthur.
“To date, we believe only a portion of the conduct constituting the cover-up has been brought to light, and further discovery is warranted for Defendants to properly present their Hyde Amendment claim,” attorneys wrote in their motion, asking Perry to hold their motion in abeyance pending additional discovery.
In a statement announcing new changes to his office’s grand jury practices last week, Boutros’ office mentioned it had taken “swift action related to internal personnel matters,” though specifics of those moves were not immediately made clear.
The Broadview charges stemmed from a confrontation between protesters and an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent driving a vehicle outside the agency’s west suburban processing facility in September. Prosecutors initially alleged the group “banged aggressively” on the vehicle and crowded together and pushed against the vehicle in order to “hinder and impede its movement.”
Prosecutors had previously thrown out charges against the other two defendants, Catherine Sharp and Joselyn Walsh, in March.
Earlier on Tuesday, U.S. Sens Tammy Duckworth and Dick Durbin called on Boutros to resign his position, and Boutros admitted he had brief contact with grand jurors on the day they indicted the Broadview defendants.
