Judge Orders Chicago U.S. Attorney to Testify in Broadview Six Case

U.S. District Judge April Perry ordered Chicago U.S. Attorney Andrew Boutros to testify under oath in federal court on November 16. The judge directed Boutros and three other prosecutors involved in the collapsed Broadview Six prosecution to appear in her courtroom. Perry stated that the group must appear to provide sworn testimony regarding specific case details.

In a seven-page order issued on Monday, Perry described Boutros’ previous denial of knowledge about staff wrongdoing as hard to credit. She called his claim that he did not learn of the issues until April nearly unfathomable. A footnote in the order clarified that the word must carries a mandatory legal meaning. The judge indicated that the testimony will focus on grand jury transcripts, redactions made to those documents, and the accuracy of statements previously provided to the court.

The ruling arrived shortly after Douglas DePodesta, the former FBI office director for Chicago, filed a lawsuit against Boutros and other Justice Department officials. DePodesta alleged that Boutros attempted to assign blame for the failed prosecution to him. The former official claimed these actions eventually forced his resignation in July. Perry cited the allegations contained in DePodesta’s lawsuit when drafting her order.

The Broadview Six case stemmed from a September 2025 protest outside an immigration holding facility in Broadview. The demonstration occurred during Operation Midway Blitz. Prosecutors alleged that a crowd pushed and damaged a federal agent’s SUV. Six individuals were charged with conspiring to impede the agent, a felony carrying a maximum six-year prison sentence. Many of the defendants held positions in local Democratic politics, which raised questions about selective prosecution.

The case collapsed on May 21 after Perry discovered alleged prosecutorial misconduct in the grand jury transcripts. She described herself as incredibly shocked by the findings. On Friday, Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward, the third-highest ranking official in the Justice Department, intervened in the matter. Woodward insisted that the United States had not agreed to provide any information sought by Perry. The judge had requested records from prosecutors weeks earlier, with a deadline arriving that Friday.

Woodward asked Perry for clarity as the deadline for handing over records approached. The official’s intervention added a layer of federal scrutiny to the local prosecution. The next scheduled step in the legal process is the November 16 hearing where the four prosecutors will provide their sworn accounts to the judge.