By Matthew Russell Lee, Patreon Maxwell Book
BBC - Guardian UK - Honduras - Vlog
SDNY COURTROOM EXCLUSIVE, Dec 16 - In the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York on December 16, Billy Ortega was brought in by US Marshals and pleaded not guilty to his role in the death by fentanyl laced cocaine of Julia Ghahramani, 26, a first-year lawyer at Akin Gump, Ross Mtangi, 40, a trading executive at Credit Suisse Group AG, and Amanda Scher, 36, a social worker.
There were four family members in the gallery, where Inner City Press was the only media.
District Judge Ronnie Abrams asked about recently provided discovery, in advance of the trial scheduled for January 18. The Assistant US Attorney replied that some phones had only recently been accessed; there are many text messages on them. Already there's this:
“Question first…is it the same as it was Sunday? Because that was not good lol, had to get rid of it,” Scher texted.
Ortega texted her back, “No new … Batch.”
Scher then replied, “Def better.”
Ortega wrote back, “Hey try not to do too much because it’s really strong. Hey boss lady you heard Lol."
Arrangements were made to copy the material onto external hard drives, including for delivery to Ortega in custody.
Inner City Press will cover the trial.
The case is US v. Ortega, et al., 22-cr-91 (Abrams)
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