Feds gave grand jury false information about ‘gender-affirming care’ whistleblower, apparently censoring him

The Justice Department tacitly admitted it provided false information to a grand jury before indicting a Texas surgeon for allegedly violating federal privacy laws by providing activist journalist Chris Rufo with documentation that contradicted Texas Children’s Hospital’s claim that it had ended so-called gender-blindness. affirmative care of minors when the Lone Star State banned the practice.

However, that was not enough for the federal judge overseeing the prosecution of Dr. Eitan Haim to provide the Houston surgeon with “all grand jury testimony and evidence relevant to the allegations of” Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act violations under false pretenses.

George W. Bush’s presidential candidate David Hittner on Tuesday rejected Haim’s request to present the materials to a grand jury without providing any details. “We’re obviously disappointed” but if it comes to that, we’ll raise the issue on appeal, said Haim’s lawyer, Ryan Patrick. Just news on Wednesday.

“The evidence speaks for itself and demonstrates that Dr. Haim obtained access properly and did not violate HIPAA,” lead attorney Marcella Burke later wrote in an email. They will continue to “preserve mistakes along the way” while protecting him from “ruthless and reckless persecution.”

Haim filed motions to dismiss and strike on Halloween, saying the government “failed to correct” factual errors in his first indictment and “introduced new, even more serious ones” in the superseding indictment, including charging him with violating “a non-existent provision of law ” “

“They had at least 5 lawyers on this case,” Haim wrote on X that day. “None of them noticed this? Did any of them actually read it or were they just handed the indictment from somewhere else?”

Lawmakers are watching. “LEGISLATION,” wrote GOP Rep. Brian Harrison, a former Department of Health and Human Services official in the last two GOP administrations, on X.

Federal authorities are also trying to control the language Haim uses during his jury trial, which begins Dec. 2. The preliminary motions ask Hittner to prohibit Haim from calling himself a “whistleblower” and using “inaccurate and inflammatory” descriptions for puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and genital surgeries such as “sterilization” and “mutilation.”

“The Justice Department needs a show trial to avoid confrontation with reality” about the nature of gender-affirming care, Haim wrote on X Monday.

The feds are upset with Haim and his lawyers for telling the media that his prosecution is intended to “intimidate and/or extort the defendant and silence whistleblowers” and that Assistant U.S. Attorney Tina Ansari , whose Texas law license was suspended for part of the case, is “despicable,” “should be ashamed of herself,” and “poorly versed in her profession.”

Hittner should limit “testimony and controversy on issues related to transgender care,” prohibit Haim from discussing the feds’ alleged motivation and “prosecutor misconduct” or “possible penalties or collateral consequences,” exclude testimony about being a “good doctor,” and prohibit him from making “disparaging remarks” about prosecutors and law enforcement, the document says.

Although many records in the case are sealed, the public can read the most important materials from the five-month-old case for free through CourtListener.

Haim’s Oct. 18 motion alleges that the government’s original charge of “violating HIPAA under false pretenses” was based on lies that “he had no patients” at TCH after completing his rotation in January 2021, and therefore “had no no reason to have access” to your electronic records.

It wasn’t until September 13, four months after the indictment, that federal authorities admitted that TCH had found records showing that Haim had treated adult and pediatric patients “well before the end” of his rotations—as late as April 2023—and that he had provided them these records are their treatment, the statement said.

Two days after they reported this to Haim’s team, the Justice Department said it had asked TCH to turn over the information.all entries“concerning Haim after the end of his rotation, “including, but not limited to, (electronic) recordings and badge readings at TCH facilities,” and the feds did not tell his team that they had “denied this request” and “completed such collection from TCH.” “

On Sept. 26, Haim’s lawyers asked for a stay, telling Judge Hittner that the feds should have known about Haim’s post-rotation procedures because their own legal discovery documented an “audit trail” showing Haim entered records on TCH patients after January 2021.

He also knew that the hospital told the HHS Office of Civil Rights that Haim “properly had access” to the system “at the relevant time in 2023 because he continued to serve patients at TCH even while on shifts at other hospitals,” the motion states. .

By removing charges that contradicted the TCH records and other evidence in the superseding indictment, the Justice Department “added false pretenses to all charges.”

Haim deserves to see the grand jury materials because the Justice Department has “repeatedly represented” to his lawyers that it has “provided full disclosure of its case file, the evidence obtained during the investigation, and the materials it intends to use at trial,” the motion states. .

The DOJ’s Oct. 25 opposition argues that it did not prove “concretely” that it “knowingly sponsored false information before the original grand jury.” transcript of the indictment through “unreasonable assumptions about the adequacy of the evidence.”

He doesn’t even admit he made a mistake, calling the charges he dropped “allegedly inaccurate” and saying that Haim was “merely speculating about what evidence and theories the government relied on in the grand jury.”

The new indictment “simply amended the charges in light of new information and narrowed the focus of the trial,” the opposition said, calling it “extremely common for the government to learn new facts or understand evidence in a new light in preparation for trial.” “

On the same day, Haim responded to the opposition, saying the government had wrongly characterized his proposal as being based on “little more than speculation and conjecture.”

His team actually “explained the history of the two indictments, how the charges changed, and the evidence the government had at various points in time” to make a “strong conclusion that the government knowingly sponsored false testimony for the superseding indictment rather than in order to raise a controversial issue as alleged by the government,” it said.

Prosecutors are “tripling the same charge in their second indictment without explanation or evidence,” Haim responded Oct. 27. “The feds are draining us,” he said, pleading for donations to show “these tyrants are done with ordinary people who don’t fight back.”

Even with a “very small” legal team of four attorneys and one paralegal “working at reduced rates,” Haim said he had already spent “well over” a million dollars in 16 months fighting “unprecedented legal charges… We’ll break even.” legal bills for decades.”

Haim’s GiveSendGo page shows he had raised about $1.16 million from nearly 14,000 people as of Thursday. Most of them are $50 or less this week, but two are $100 each and one is $500.

Chaim’s wife Andrea, he said, is a federal prosecutor. She was six months pregnant when the first allegations were made public. She told Fox News she was “terrified” that her “hero” husband would miss the birth of her daughter or the “first part” of her life, and accused her employer of “unfounded political persecution.” for telling the truth.”

Conservative pundit Mike Cernovich said the feds had exposed themselves by saying they had “fallen for a hoax” by suggesting prosecutors could not “unearth the truth from false accusations.”

The feds mistakenly believed that Chaim, “a young surgeon with a new family, would give up in a moment,” Chaim responded. “They were clearly thinking wrong.”