A federal judge referred a leftist prosecutor backed by billionaire George Soros to the Justice Department for investigation.
U.S. District Judge Paul Diamond said Tuesday that Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner may have broken the law in his handling of a convicted murderer’s appeal to get out of prison. Diamond said credible evidence showed that Krasner may have made false declarations under oath, committed perjury, obstructed justice, and engaged in a conspiracy.
“The evidence before me and the facts I have found reveal more than a disabling conflict,” Diamond said. “I have thus reluctantly concluded that Philadelphia’s highest law enforcement official and one of his top assistants may have violated the law.”
The referral to the U.S. Attorney’s Office comes over a legal saga revolving around an effort by Dennis Johnson to argue that he was wrongfully imprisoned for murder. Johnson was convicted in 2009 of killing Kenyatta Smith during an armed robbery.
In November 2022, Krasner’s office argued in a concession brief that Johnson was entitled to appeal his case because his lawyer didn’t object to certain evidence during the initial trial. That brief was withdrawn in June 2026 after the District Attorney’s Office found “material misstatements.”
Those briefs triggered a complex back-and-forth with Diamond and the state attorney general’s office, which argued Krasner and his office should be disqualified from the case. Diamond agreed that Krasner should be disqualified, as well as Matthew Stiegler, an assistant district attorney.
Diamond said that he found Stiegler’s testimony to be “often contradictory, evasive, or outright dishonest.”
The judge added that Stiegler instructed former Assistant District Attorney Jaclyn Mason to file the concession brief after meetings with the Innocence Project and the Defenders Association. According to evidence presented to Diamond, Stiegler told Mason, who had no criminal litigation experience, to rubber-stamp the arguments used by Johnson and the Innocence Project.
“Matt’s already made the assessment and the decision here that this is going to be a case that should be conceded,” Mason reportedly said. Stiegler also told Mason, “if it’s good enough for the Innocence Project, it’s good enough for me,” according to court records.
“Stiegler thus did not instruct Mason to do any independent investigation because it had already been done by Johnson’s counsel,” Diamond said. “Stiegler and Mason thus never discussed the need to interview witnesses, and he did not suggest that she review any record material.”
Diamond said Stiegler appointed Mason because of her inexperience so that “she would not question his actions or order.”
In the resulting dispute over the concession brief, Diamond said that Krasner and Stiegler attempted to “sacrifice” Mason to protect themselves.
After facing pressure to move the case out of his office and to the state attorney general, people in Krasner’s office said that he “went on a long, extended rant yet again about how he hated” the attorney general and how everyone in the office was “Nazis.”
“We need to protect the office. We need somebody in the room so that they can control the proceedings,” Krasner reportedly said, according to testimony.
Krasner, who received more than $1.7 million in Soros-linked money during his first run for the position in 2017, disputed Diamond’s ruling.
“I respectfully and vigorously disagree with the court’s findings of fact and conclusions of law,” he said. “I look forward to appealing to the higher court as soon as the law allows. This remains a pending matter, which limits for now my and my office’s ability to respond in the media.”
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