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Attorneys involved in the prosecution of Jeremy Johnson and four others accused of bank fraud and money laundering have asked that a four-week trial scheduled for September be delayed.
According to a motion filed Wednesday, federal prosecutors and attorneys for all five defendants agree that the trial should be moved to a new date because the defense attorneys need more time to secure expert witnesses.
The defense attorneys say they are also now ready to "pool their resources" before trial, now that the deadline for a plea deal has passed, and all five defendants appear to be heading for trial.
As of Thursday, U.S. District Court Magistrate Paul Warner has not yet ruled on the issue.
At a hearing last week, Assistant U.S. Attorney Robert Lunnen told the judge that prosecutors will likely dismiss some of the 86 criminal counts against Johnson and the others: Scott Leavitt, Bryce Payne, Ryan Riddle, and Loyd Johnston. He said the dismissals would happen before the end of July, and would involve money laundering and possibly other counts.
During that hearing, defense attorneys expressed reservations about the timeline for the dismissals, saying they didn't want to waste time preparing to defend their clients on certain counts that would end up being dismissed just months before the lengthy trial begins.
The five defendants are facing a combined 86 counts of conspiracy, bank fraud and money laundering in connection with iWorks, which allegedly baited online consumers with small fees and then made unauthorized charges on their credit or debit cards.
The defendants are accused of setting up merchant accounts for shell companies in order to continue to process credit and debit cards after other banks closed processing accounts because of a large number of customer chargebacks.
All five have pleaded not guilty. Johnson has said the creation of shell companies was a standard industry practice encouraged by credit card processing companies and banks.
The Federal Trade Commission first sued Johnson, his iWorks company and others in December 2010 in federal court in Las Vegas, saying the company baited online consumers with small fees and then made unauthorized charges on their credit or debit cards. Johnson and the others have denied those allegation and that case, which is separate from the Utah criminal charges, also appears headed for a trial.
Johnson was charged in Salt Lake City in June 2011 and indicted again along with the others in March 2013 after a plea agreement fell apart.
Johnson also is at the center of some of the charges pending against former Utah Attorneys General John Swallow and Mark Shurtleff, which allege in part that they granted favors after receiving gifts or campaign donations.