By Luc Cohen
NEW YORK, Aug 10 (Reuters) – A U.S. judge on Monday dismissed criminal charges against Indian billionaire Gautam Adani, but said the Justice Department’s decision to abandon the fraud and bribery case was concerning.
Brooklyn-based U.S. District Judge Nicholas Garaufis’ decision to grant federal prosecutors’ rare bid to toss the case came after he inquired into their reasons for doing so, including whether Adani’s November 2024 promise to invest $10 billion in the United States was a factor in the decision to drop the charges.
The Justice Department’s decision marked the latest instance in which federal prosecutors had sought to drop a high-profile white-collar criminal prosecution during Republican President Donald Trump’s second term in the White House.
In dismissing the charges against Adani, Garaufis said he was satisfied that the investment pledge did not factor into the Justice Department’s decision, and acknowledged that judges’ role in reviewing federal prosecutors’ decisions to drop charges was limited.
But he criticized Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General Trent McCotter for collaborating with Adani’s defense lawyers in deciding to dismiss the charges without input from the prosecutors or agents who investigated the case.
“The irregularities in the decision to dismiss the indictment are concerning,” Garaufis wrote. “McCotter appears to have eschewed the professional opinions of innumerable officials from various federal offices and replaced them with his singular judgment.”
A Justice Department spokesperson pointed to a July 4 filing in which McCotter said he decided to drop the charges after meeting with defense lawyers and other Justice Department lawyers and conducting his own research and analysis.
In a statement posted on X, Gautam Adani said, “I welcome the U.S. Court’s decision with humility and deep respect for the judicial process.”
The judge wrote that his dismissal of the case should not be interpreted as his agreement with the Justice Department’s decision to drop the charges or an opinion about the merits of the case. He asked the Justice Department to submit more information to help him decide whether to dismiss charges against additional defendants.
JUSTICE DEPARTMENT SAYS CASE IS PRIMARILY FOREIGN
Adani was charged in 2024 with agreeing to bribe Indian government officials so a subsidiary of his Adani Group could win approval to develop a solar energy plant, then misleading U.S. investors by providing reassuring information about his company’s anti-corruption practices. Adani Group has consistently denied wrongdoing.
Adani himself has not appeared in U.S. court to respond to the charges.
In the July 4 court filing, McCotter said the case was primarily foreign, hard to prove and inconsistent with the agency’s current priorities.
In a separate resolution to civil charges brought by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Gautam Adani agreed to pay $6 million and his nephew, Sagar Adani, agreed to pay $12 million.
Adani Enterprises Limited has separately agreed to pay $275 million to the U.S. Treasury Department to settle alleged violations of Iran sanctions.
JUDGE SAYS IT IS ‘UP TO THE PUBLIC’
In the filing, McCotter also denied as false what he called media stories suggesting he sought to dismiss the case in part because of a promise by Adani to invest money in the United States.
In a sworn declaration filed in court on July 15, Adani acknowledged having previously promised to invest $10 billion in the U.S. and said his lawyers told the Justice Department in meetings that the pledge “might be part of a resolution of these matters.”
Robert Giuffra, a lawyer for Adani, said in a July 15 court declaration that the defendants had told the Justice Department the Adani Group was “amenable” to following through on Adani’s investment pledge as part of a resolution to the case.
Garaufis wrote that he took “no position on the ultimate propriety of Mr. Giuffra’s repeat attempts to resolve this bribery case with monetary offers.”
“It is up to the public to decide what effect offers of this kind have on the equal administration of justice and the rule of law,” the judge wrote.
(Reporting by Luc Cohen in New York; Editing by Jamie Freed and Rosalba O’Brien)
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