Joseph Tully of California is Keith Raniere’s attorney. He represents Raniere in two of his four pending legal matters.
Tully represents Raniere in his challenge to his 2019 conviction. This is a two-fold attack. First, he represents him before the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals on an appeal of his conviction.
He bases the appeal on a series of alleged improper trial judge rulings.
Tully also represents Raniere before the US District Court on a Rule 33 motion. He bases his motion on allegations that the FBI tampered with evidence to convict him.
Keith Raniere talks to his followers.
Two courts cannot hear attacks on a conviction simultaneously. The appellate court has priority. The district court must stay the Rule 33 motion until the appellate court rules.
If the higher court reverses Raniere’s conviction, Raniere can have a new trial. The DOJ must decide whether to retry him. If they choose not to, Raniere would be free.
The appellate court may also “split the baby” and decide that some of Raniere’s claims have merit, while others do not.
This could lead to some years being shaved off his 120-year sentence. Raniere is 62, so anything less than a drastic reduction does not mean much.
If Raniere gets his conviction overturned, the district judge will not hear the Rule 33 motion. If the appellate court affirms some or all of the conviction, the district court may hear the Rule 33 motion.
Complicating the matter is that Raniere filed a motion for the trial judge to disqualify himself. Raniere claims his trial judge, Nicholas G. Garaufis railroaded him because of bias.
Judge Nicholas G. Garaufis.
If the 2nd Circuit denies Raniere’s appeal, Judge Garaufis will decide the Rule 33 motion. He has several options. He can disqualify himself, and the court will assign a new judge.
If he chooses not to disqualify himself, he may hear the Rule 33 or dismiss it without hearing it. If the latter happens, Raniere can appeal the dismissal of Rule 33 to the 2nd Circuit.
If Garaufis disqualifies himself, the replacement judge also has the choice to hear or not hear the Rule 33 motion.
As for the appeal, Tully and the DOJ have filed their briefs, and a panel of three judges heard oral arguments. What remains is for the panel to make a decision.
There’s no timeframe for any decisions now.
Meanwhile, Raniere has taken to the media to get support for his Rule 33 FBI tampering motion.
Attorney Tully does not represent Raniere in a civil lawsuit, where he is a defendant against about 70 plaintiffs who claim he abused them. Ranniere is unrepresented in that case.
Tully does not represent Raniere in his civil suit against the Bureau of Prisons. Raniere is represented by Stacy Scheff or Arizona in that lawsuit.
Apropos of their attempt to get media, Tully and five others held a press conference on October 6. In that press conference, they introduced Alan Dershowitz as a member of the Raniere legal team.
Below is what Raniere’s lead attorney said about the FBI tampering.
Joseph Tully wants an evidentiary hearing to present his “shocking” evidence of tampering.
There is no need to fabricate evidence for a guilty man. The fact that they fabricated evidence here and to the degree they did, shocks the conscience – Tully.
By Joseph Tully
The level of government malfeasance uncovered here is extreme. Top forensic experts have documented multiple instances of evidence tampering, requiring the coordination of multiple actors to frame Keith Raniere with some of the most heinous charges in our judicial system. The government would not have needed to go to such lengths to create evidence if he were guilty. However, his innocence or guilt is irrelevant. This is about all our rights to due process and our right to receive a trial free of manufactured and altered evidence by bad government actors. The court must hear this evidence immediately and grant the appropriate relief.
I am further concerned about Mr. Raniere’s well-being in custody. It appears he has been retaliated against in prison based on our filings. First, he was kept in solitary confinement conditions in the special housing unit [SHU] for 97 days without cause and was not given timely hearings. Now, he is enduring more confinement in the special housing unit again, without cause—this time for over 60 days and counting. I call upon the warden of the facility where Mr. Raniere is housed, Warden Mark Qataris, to investigate Mr. Raniere’s conditions. I’m further concerned that Mr. Raniere may be transferred to another location where his safety may be threatened.
So right now, this is a post-conviction case. So this is after a jury trial. There is an appeal filed, and it was argued, and it is now waiting for the Second Circuit to file it. So there’s a trial court and then the appellate court. Right now, the case is with the appellate court. However, the tampering issues that we’re uncovering can only be addressed in the trial court.
. We’re basically waiting to hear from the Second Circuit and the District Court…
[Editor’s Note: Shaila Dewan with the New York Times asked, ‘I thought they also used the existence of a scar to date the photos.’Tully responded:]
There was some testimony regarding that. However, there is an absolute defense to that. The existence of a scar is a misnomer. The subject of these photos had an appendectomy, and when she leans over, you can see scar tissue bunch up. So it’s not the existence of a scar. It’s scar tissue bunching up in certain positions. In other positions, that scar tissue doesn’t bunch up, and it doesn’t show. So the existence of the scar was used in the trial. However, it went unrebutted, and there is clearly material to rebut it.
Commentary Begins here:
Tully believes the FBI and others may be guilty of perjury and tampering with evidence under USC 1519.
In the scar tissue “issue,” Tully takes an unusual position. There was no scar. Camila does not show marks of her appendectomy in certain poses.
I have never seen the contraband photos. I doubt Tully has seen them. None of the forensic experts Raniere retained have seen them, as far as I know. They base their reports on metadata.
From written filings and testimony, we know there are 22 photos of Camila. Of these, most do not include her face.
Based on an FBI affidavit, two photos show her face. She is described as posing naked on Raniere’s loft bed at 8 Hale.
Photo of loft bed at 8 Hale.
She was 15 if no one altered the metadata, which dates the photos to Nov. 2 and 24, 2005. According to FBI Special Agent Michael Weniger, no scar tissue is visible in the photos.
According to Weniger, the vast majority are closeups of her genitals. In a closeup, the appendectomy scar tissue, or lack thereof, would not be within the range of the camera.
Lauren Salzman
No one who knew Camila, who testified at the trial, identified her photos. Only Weniger, who had never met her, identified the photos.
Her biological sister, Daniela, and her founding sister of DOS, Lauren Salzman, testified. They testified Raniere used a camera to photograph them during the same time in 2005.
The prosecution did not ask Daniela – who testified she knew what the scar looked like – or Lauren, who posed nude with Camila – to identify Camilla’s photos.
The DOJ did not even ask them to identify their own nude photos.
Camila did not testify at trial. She spoke at Raniere’s sentencing. She did say he took photos of her when she was 15. She did not say the photos used at trial were photos Raniere took when she was 15.
This may have been an oversight.
The DOJ knew Raniere was challenging the authenticity of the photos. She could have virtually put this to bed in 2020 by declaring the photos used at trial were authentic.
She has yet to do so.
Talk about media strategy. If she did it now, this would implode the PR efforts of Raniere and company.
If Camila declared under oath that Raniere took the photos used at his trial in November 2005, the media would pounce on it.
The FBI would be spared. Almost any lingering doubt about their integrity would be extinguished.
The FBI’s integrity is being challenged, if not extinguished, in many places. This would be a strategic move. Easy to pull off.
It would mute Dershowitz, Tully, and Kiper. It might even mute the intrepid Suneel Chakravorty, Raniere’s power of attorney.
Suneel top right. Raniere top left.
It would not necessarily kill the Rule 33. There is still the question of how the photos got to a curiously culled hard drive.
The FBI found the camera under the desk and hard drive on a shelf in Raniere’s library.
At some point, Camila would be subject to cross examination, but it would smash the PR to pieces.
And shut everyone up on the PR end.
If Camila filed an affidavit that those photos were real. That they were of her and taken by Raniere in 2005, this show is all but closed.
It’s curtains, boys.
All it would take is one sentence: “Keith Raniere took the 22 photos of me used at trial in 2005 when I was 15.”
Scar tissue would not mean a damn thing.
All the press conferences in all the world, with all the biggest names in law and forensics in attendance, would not mean a damn thing.
I wonder why they don’t do it.
Camila by MK10ART.
