BALTIMORE — A federal judge has rejected former State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby’s request to replace her home detention with a nightly curfew.

Mosby had asked U.S. District Judge Lydia Kay Griggsby to amend her home detention to a nightly curfew allowing her to travel throughout Maryland, without prior approval, between 6 a.m. and 9 p.m. for work.

Her attorneys cited her new job with a California-based company that acquires and runs mental health, substance abuse and transitional housing facilities.

Griggsby denied Mosby’s request Tuesday, saying in an order that Mosby had not provided enough information about her employment to probation officials and, because of that, had “not shown that the requested modification of the conditions of her supervision is warranted.”

Mosby was convicted of perjury and mortgage fraud by separate federal juries after two trials in Greenbelt in November and January. Griggsby sentenced Mosby in May to a year of home confinement and three years of supervised release.

The first jury found that Mosby lied about suffering financial hardship to withdraw roughly $80,000 from her city retirement account under a provision in the federal CARES Act, Congress’ first coronavirus pandemic relief legislation, to pay for two properties in Florida. In the second case, jurors determined Mosby lied on mortgage documents to close on a condo on the Gulf Coast.

The former two-term Democratic elected prosecutor has appealed her convictions and Griggsby’s order mandating she forfeit the Florida Gulf Coast condo at the center of the mortgage fraud case. Through her attorneys, Mosby argues her prosecution was “ill-advised and ill-conceived,” with hopes that an appeals court would find flaws in her trial and undo her convictions.

Attorney Andrew Radding, a former federal prosecutor and criminal defense lawyer who is not involved in Mosby’s case, told The Baltimore Sun that it’s common for defendants sentenced to home detention to seek to modify their supervision.

“But it depends on the circumstances and the timing,” Radding said. “I was very surprised at this latest petition. I mean, she’s barely served her sentence. She’s got a lot of freedom under that sentencing order. Frankly, it would not have served the sentencing purpose that Griggsby had imposed had this been granted. It would have been effectively a non-sentence and I think Griggsby must have seen it that way.”

He noted that Griggsby allowed Mosby to travel to California in September for an in-person visit with the company that eventually hired her. Griggsby denied a related request for permission to attend staff dinners for employment purposes during that trip.

“Defense lawyers always push for modification and do the most they can,” Radding said. “But she hasn’t even served half of it. While I think requests for modifications are commonplace and occasionally the probation department will enjoin and not oppose it, here, they must have felt it was premature.”

Maryland Federal Public Defender James Wyda, who is representing Mosby, declined to comment Wednesday about Griggsby’s order.

In a motion Friday, Wyda and Assistant Federal Public Defender Paresh S. Patel sought to allay concerns from the Maryland U.S. Attorney’s Office, which prosecuted Mosby, and federal Probation and Pretrial Services. Both of those entities objected to Mosby’s request to modify her home detention.

Prosecutors and probation officers expressed concerns that Mosby hadn’t completed community service — Griggsby ordered Mosby do 100 hours as part of her punishment — and that she communicated with her probation officer through her attorneys. The government argued her home detention conditions should remain until she maintains employment for a sustained period.

Wyda and Patel argued the curfew is essential for her to work the “at least 30 hours” required under her supervised release, as well as to pay her bills and support her family after the “financial devastation she has faced since her prosecution.” They also said she could complete the community service in the remaining seven months of her sentence.

Mosby’s new job description, her lawyers wrote, includes travel for evaluating current and prospective facilities, establishing and maintaining relationships with partners, and enhancing collaboration with community, government and service providers, according to her attorneys’ motion. As such, the motion argued, advanced notice of travel would be “unworkable.”

“Although the court’s judgment, as noted, already permits Ms. Mosby to leave for employment, it would become a logistical nightmare for both Probation and Ms. Mosby if she is required to seek and obtain approval every time she needs to engage in travel for work or incidental travel related to work,” Mosby’s lawyers wrote.

Public court documents do not name Mosby’s new employer.

In her order denying Mosby’s request, Griggsby said that probation officials had requested more information about Mosby’s new position as “Director of Global Strategic Planning, to better understand the Defendant’s work, specific responsibilities and goals.”

“The United States Probation Office,” Griggsby’s order continued, “also informs the Court that it seeks additional information from the Defendant regarding this employment opportunity to rule out any third-party risk concerns, because the Defendant’s job description indicates that her position involves collaboration with finance and operations teams to develop and manage budgets and drive strategic partnerships with state, local and communal stakeholders, which requires routine travel.”

---------

©2024 The Baltimore Sun. Visit at baltimoresun.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.