A federal judge has admitted that he and the prosecution were at fault for violating the speedy trial rights of a defendant by failing to bring her to trial in time, and has consequently dismissed the charges against her.

U.S. District Court Judge William J. Martínez did not dispute the calculations of Mykhael Kuciapinski, who determined her case was at least 214 days beyond the legal deadline for a jury trial. The figure accounted for various exclusions of time that are permissible under federal law. Nonetheless, it still exceeded the 70-day deadline established in the Speedy Trial Act.

Although he attributed the bulk of the unjustified delay to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Martínez took responsibility for neglecting to rule on certain key requests over the past few years.

“Moreover, and notwithstanding the Government’s conduct, the Court cannot in good conscience ignore its own actions in this case. Certain motions have been left pending without resolution for over a year,” the judge wrote in an Aug. 3 order. “As such, the Court accepts some culpability for the delays.”

The unusual move from Martínez terminates, for now, the criminal prosecution of Kuciapinski for allegedly conspiring to defraud the U.S. government, for which she faced two dozen charges, each with penalties ranging from five to 20 years in prison. However, Martínez’s decision still enables the government to pursue the criminal case anew.

A spokesperson for the U.S. attorney’s office in Colorado declined to comment and Kuciapinski’s lawyers did not respond to emails asking about the decision.

The Sixth Amendment guarantees the right to a speedy trial and the federal Speedy Trial Act requires that defendants be brought to trial within 70 days of an indictment or a court appearance. There are certain reasons for delay that may be excluded from that calculation, including for pretrial motions and a judge’s consideration of the requests, or if a judge finds the “ends of justice” favor a pause in the proceedings.

A grand jury indicted Kuciapinski in September 2018 and the government filed a superseding indictment one year later. Kuciapinski was the owner of Gordian Polaris Sirius Corporation and her former husband, Kevin Kuciapinski, was a U.S. Air Force major and intelligence director assigned to Buckley Air Force Base.

The government alleged Kevin Kuciapinski and another intelligence worker at Buckley, Randolph Stimac, conspired to steer a nearly $1.5 million contract toward Mykhael Kuciapinski’s company by providing her with inside information. The government charged all three participants, with Mykhael Kuciapinski accused specifically of perpetrating fraud against the United States, wire fraud and unlawfully obtaining procurement information.

In his order, Martínez walked through the various reasons why, as of August 2022, Kuciapinski’s case was still pending. Kuciapinski’s ex-husband requested classified information in September 2019 for his defense. At the time, there was no secured facility in the U.S. District Courthouse in Denver, and the lawyers and court staff needed security clearance to view classified files. Kuciapinski realized her case would not rely on classified information, and filed a motion to sever her trial from that of her co-defendants to avoid the associated delays.

Martínez never ruled on her request. The judge also held out on deciding a motion Kuciapinski filed in December 2020 relating to the discovery of evidence.

At the same time, the COVID-19 pandemic affected the ability of Colorado’s federal court to hold trials.

“While the precise number of days lost to the pandemic cannot be calculated with any reasonable degree of precision, the Court believes it is critical to the understanding of the protracted nature of this litigation,” Martínez observed.

In February of this year, Kuciapinski asked Martínez to dismiss the criminal charges, alleging a violation of the Speedy Trial Act and of her Sixth Amendment right to a speedy trial.

“The Government was obligated to plan a path for each defendant to get to trial within the allotted speedy trial clock,” wrote Kuciapinski’s lawyers. “Instead, the Government’s calculated strategy was to indict the defendants before the statute of limitations ran and to buy indefinite amounts of time before the District Court for the purpose of further investigating and to discharge its existing discovery obligations. In so doing, the Government ignored its obligations under the Speedy Trial Act.”

Kuciapinski also alleged the prosecution had prevented her from working in her profession or caring for her elderly out-of-state parents while under indictment, accusing the U.S. attorney’s office of “mocking” her when it told her to change her clothing style to stay employed.

The government responded by claiming Kuciapinski was responsible for much of the delay in her trial.

“Even as defendant M. Kuciapinski continues to seek a severance from her codefendants and argues for quicker trial, defendant M. Kuciapinski continues to file motions that delay the trial in this case,” wrote Assistant U.S. Attorney Jeremy Sibert.

Martínez largely sided with Kuciapinski in finding that, even after excluding all of the delays permitted under the Speedy Trial Act, the case was well beyond the legal deadline. He acknowledged he never held a hearing on Kuciapinski’s motion to sever her trial from that of her co-defendants. He also did not act quickly on other key motions in the case, nor did the government ask him to find that the “ends of justice” merited a postponement. 

Therefore, the judge concluded, the speedy trial clock had not stopped ticking while the motions were lingering.

“Again, the Court accepts some responsibility,” Martínez wrote. “However, any undue delay by the Court … does not relieve the Government of its obligation to bring a defendant to trial within the time allotted by Congress in the Speedy Trial Act.”

Although Martínez determined Kuciapinski’s statutory rights were violated, he did not find the delay had also violated her rights under the Sixth Amendment, which requires a different legal test.

The case is United States v. Kuciapinski.