'Out of control' judge puts spotlight on Fani Willis in another high-profile case: expert

Defense attorneys in a high-profile Georgia case being tried by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis' office have called for the recusal of the judge presiding over the racketeering trial.

Judge Ural Glanville held a private meeting with the prosecutor's office, a state witness, and an attorney for that witness, and his response to revelations about that meeting prompted defense attorneys to seek his recusal in the trial involving alleged Young Slime Life gang members, reported Newsweek.

Glanville has "become a member of the prosecution team," argued attorney Brian Steel, the defense counsel for Grammy-winning rapper Young Thug in the case, saying the meeting allowed Willis' team "to induce a material witness to testify."

Former federal prosecutor Michael McAuliffe told Newsweek the motion's "tone" was "extraordinary," because "it accuses the judge of essentially acting in league with the prosecutors and being biased against the defense."

"It also means the strategy is to inject as much controversy, maybe even chaos, into very lengthy proceedings with the likely goal of forcing a mistrial," McAuliffe said.

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Young Thug, whose real name is Jeffrey Lamar Williams, has been charged with 27 other defendants, and while only six of them are standing trial, the proceedings have dragged out for nearly seven months and will likely continue well into next year.

"This case was always going to be a beast to try," Anthony Michael Kreis, an assistant professor of law at Georgia State University. "It's legally complex. There's many defendants. There's more lawyers than defendants. But once the focus became about personalities and not the allegations and the evidence, all those pre-existing challenges were exacerbated."

The judge denied Steel's motion for recusal, saying his claims were insufficient, and held the attorney in contempt for refusing to say who informed him of the ex-parte meeting and ordered him to spend 10 weekends, or 20 days, in jail, although he's appealing that decision.

"The Brian Steel contempt circus was a bigger embarrassment for the judge than the D.A.'s office," said former federal prosecutor Neama Rahmani, "but there is still plenty for Willis' office to be concerned about ... There is the perception that Fulton County is out of control."

The Young Thug trial could bleed over into another, even more high-profile case that Willis' office is trying – Donald Trump's election interference case – unless a Georgia appeals court removes her over her romantic relationship with a special prosecutor who stepped aside over concerns raised by one of the former president's co-defendants.

"Even people who haven't been following the trial closely saw Judge Granville blow up on Steel for no good reason on social media," Rahmani said. "Of course, everyone had already heard of Willis hiring her boyfriend, Nathan Wade, as special counsel in the Trump case and the ensuing side show that resulted in his disqualification."

"Willis has botched both cases because of these self-inflicted mistakes and charging and trying too many co-defendants at once," he added. "Those decisions have ground both proceedings to a halt."