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Persevering an eight-year legal maze to prosecute Brian David Mitchell has garnered national recognition for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Salt Lake City and other state employees who worked to bring the 57-year-old street preacher to justice for the 2002 kidnapping and rape of Elizabeth Smart.
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder on Friday honored the Utah litigation team of Assistant U.S. Attorneys Felice John Viti, David F. Backman and Diana Hagen; victim witness coordinator Cecelia Swainston; supervisory litigation support specialist Yvette G. Laughter; FBI Special Agent Eric Lerohl; and Deputy Salt Lake County District Attorney Alicia Cook, who also holds the title of special assistant U.S. Attorney.
The group received an award for "Superior Performance by a Litigative Team" at a Washington, D.C., ceremony.
The award recognized the federal team's efforts to keep Mitchell's case alive after it stalled in state court.
The state case had been in legal limbo for years due to issues surrounding Mitchell's mental competency. In federal court, meanwhile, Mitchell was found competent, tried before a jury, convicted of crimes against Smart and sentenced to life in prison.
In 2003, Mitchell was charged in state court with eight felonies, including aggravated kidnapping, aggravated burglary and aggravated sexual assault. In 2005, 3rd District Judge Judith Atherton declared the man incompetent to stand trial. Mitchell was ordered to the Utah State Hospital for treatment, but refused to comply with efforts to restore his mental state. Atherton denied a 2008 motion by prosecutors to forcibly medicate Mitchell.
Federal prosecutors then took on the case and successfully argued to U.S. District Judge Dale Kimball that Mitchell was competent, in part by providing a slew of lay-witnesses who testified Mitchell acted fairly normally when not being observed by doctors.
At Mitchell's federal trial, which concluded in December 2010, defense attorneys claimed Mitchell suffered from religious delusions and said he was insane at the time he kidnapped Smart and during her nine months of captivity. Jurors rejected that theory.
Holder told the team responsible for prosecuting Mitchell that their work "represents the very best that this department has to offer."
The team's work, Holder said, "embodies our ongoing commitment not merely to win cases, but to do justice; to protect our fellow citizens; to empower the most vulnerable among us; and to uphold the rule of law."
Also recognized at the Washington, D.C., ceremony was Assistant U.S. Attorney Robert C. Lunnen, of Highland, who was honored for work as a justice official in Afghanistan from October 2009 to March 2011. Lunnen served as a justice attache, a position that represents the attorney general and the Department of Justice abroad.
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