ATLANTA: A judge on Friday is expected to release the full report compiled by a special grand jury that helped an investigation by the Georgia prosecutor who ultimately indicted former President Donald Trump and 18 others.
The special grand jury spent seven months hearing from some 75 witnesses before completing a report in December with recommendations for Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis on charges related to attempts to overturn the 2020 presidential election. Willis had said she needed the panel's subpoena power to compel the testimony of witnesses who might otherwise not have been willing to appear.
While most of the intrigue in the inner workings of the case has diminished with the filing of charges, the special grand jury report will still provide the public with insight into how closely the indictment tracks with the panel's recommendations on who should be indicted. It should reveal whether the panel envisioned the wide-ranging conspiracy that prosecutors ultimately alleged.
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney ordered the partial release of the report in February but declined to immediately release the panel’s recommendations on who should or should not be prosecuted. The judge said at the time that he wanted to protect people’s due process rights.
McBurney said in a new order filed Aug. 28 that the due process concerns were moot since a regular grand jury has indicted Trump and 18 other people under the state's anti-racketeering law. All have pleaded not guilty.
McBurney had set a deadline of 5 p.m. on Sept. 6 for anyone who might believe that any part of the report shouldn’t be published to object to its release. It didn’t appear from the online court docket that anyone had objected, so McBurney is expected to make the full report public at 10 a.m. Friday.
Many of those indicted — including former New York mayor and Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani and Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows — are known to have testified before the special grand jury. Trump himself was never called and did not appear before the panel.
The parts of the report previously released in February included its introduction and conclusion, as well as a section in which the grand jurors expressed concerns that one or more witnesses may have lied under oath and urged prosecutors to seek charges for perjury. The panel’s foreperson had said in news interviews that the special grand jurors had recommended that numerous people be indicted.