John Facciola
John M. Facciola was a federal magistrate judge for the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. He was appointed to this position in 1997.[1] Facciola retired in December 2014.[2]
Education
Facciola received his A.B. from College of the Holy Cross and his J.D. from Georgetown University Law School.[1]
Career
Facciola began his legal career as an assistant district attorney. He then went into private practice until he joined the United States Attorney's Office in 1982. In 1989, he became chief of the Special Proceedings Section, where he served until joining the United States District Court for the District of Columbia in 1997.[2]
Noteworthy cases
Judge issues strong order after overly broad warrant request (2014)
According to Magistrate John Facciola, the Department of Justice (DOJ) continued to submit overly broad search warrants for magistrate approval, despite being warned against doing so. Warrant applications are normally sealed, but Judge Facciola made his ruling public, though little information about the underlying case is known. He wrote that prosecutors “submit overly broad warrants and make no effort to balance the law enforcement interest against the obvious expectation of privacy email account holders have in their communications.”[3] At the heart of a search warrant is the need to show probable cause for why the search should be carried out. In the case for which Judge Facciola wrote, prosecutors wanted a copy of, or data on, every email, contact, photo and transaction stored in the person’s email account, regardless of relevance to their case. Judge Facciola concluded that to issue the warrant the government requested would be “repugnant to the Fourth Amendment.”[3]
This is not the first time Judge Facciola had concerns over DOJ warrant requests. He indicated that in a two-month period, he raised similar concerns 20 times.
Articles:
See also
- United States District Court for the District of Columbia
- United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit
External links
- Courthouse News Service, "Kenyans can sue in U.S. over embassy bombings," May 31, 2013
- Courthouse News Service, "Judge sidelines Kenyans' case against Bin Laden," January 13, 2012
Footnotes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 United States District Court for the District of Columbia, "Facciola Biography," accessed July 21, 2014
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Law Technology News, "Judge John Facciola Announces Retirement," July 1, 2014
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 NY Times, “Judge rebukes officials over requests for broad email searches,” March 19, 2014
