Entrapment in play as appeals court looks at plot to kidnap Michigan governor

DETROIT (AP) — An appeals court is raising major questions about the trial of two key figures in a plot to kidnap Michigan’s governor — and putting federal prosecutors on the defensive as the government tries to preserve the extraordinary guilty verdicts.

After hearing arguments in May, the court took the uncommon step of asking for more written briefs on the impact of a trial judge’s decision to bar evidence that might have supported claims of entrapment made by Adam Fox and Barry Croft Jr.

Fox and Croft are in prison for leading a conspiracy to try to snatch Gov. Gretchen Whitmer in 2020. Prosecutors said a ragtag band of anti-government extremists had hoped that an abduction at her vacation home would spark a civil war around the same time as the presidential election.

Defense attorneys wanted jurors to see more communications between FBI handlers, undercover agents and paid informants who had fooled Fox and Croft and got inside the group. They argued that any plan to kidnap Whitmer was repeatedly pushed by those government actors.

But at the 2022 trial, U.S. District Judge Robert Jonker greatly restricted the use of certain text messages and audio recordings under his interpretation of evidence rules.

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