YNW Melly attends hearing on motion to recuse state prosecutors from his case on October 6, 2023. Still from Law&Crime Network’s YouTube live stream of the hearing.
YNW Melly returned to court for a hearing on a motion filed by his attorneys to recuse the Broward County State Attorney’s Office from prosecuting his case. The defense alleges that Assistant State Attorney Kristine Bradley and her colleagues failed to disclose the fact that the case’s lead detective, Mark Moretti, had executed a search warrant to obtain Melly’s mother’s cell phone outside his jurisdiction, rendering the search illegal. They further allege that Moretti used excessive force in the search. If the state is recused, a special prosecutor will likely be assigned to the case.
The alleged misconduct was brought to the court’s attention, ironically, because of an admission by one of the state’s own attorneys, Michelle Boutros that she had witnessed the potentially illegal behavior. Moretti seizing Melly’s mother’s phone outside of his jurisdiction would have been permissible if a Broward County Sheriff’s Deputy was present, Boutros explained, but the detective, who is employed by the Miramar Police Department, went ahead without said deputy present. Many minutes at Friday’s hearing were spent litigating whether a request made by Moretti to a Broward deputy that he pretend he was in the room during the search — “You need to say you were here,” Boutros recollected him saying — had been serious or a joke.
At one point in Friday’s hearing, defense attorneys went so far as to say the prosecution’s alleged cover-up of the incident amounted to felony obstruction of justice, as the South Florida Sun Sentinel notes. After hearing testimony from both sides, Judge John Murphy said he’ll defer his decision on whether to recuse the state — or, at the very least, Bradley, who supposedly orchestrated it — from prosecuting Melly’s case.
The judge will also consider a motion by the defense to dismiss the case entirely on the same grounds, but he’s indicated that ruling will not come today. The hearing on that motion will take place on Friday, October 13. Before that, though, he’ll rule on 13 other motions to suppress evidence and quash previous court decisions — three each day of next week. Due to the extra time needed for these deliberations, Murphy has pushed jury selection for the trial back at least a week from its initially scheduled October 9 start date.
Read our breakdown of everything that’s happened in YNW Melly’s double homicide trial so far. And watch the full hearing via the Law&Crime Network’s YouTube channel below.
Update Friday, October 6, 4 p.m. This post has been updated to reflect new developments that ocurred during today’s hearing.
