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The Flapping Holes in Jeanine Pirro’s Davey Hearn Juicebox Jam
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In this post, I laughed at how liberally Jeanine Pirro’s prosecutors (the motion was signed by Michael Spence, the Chief of DC’s Superior Court Division, not the AUSAs who had been working the case) used the passive voice in the motion to dismiss the case against Davey Hearn.Even on its face, though, their excuse has some pretty obvious holes. After pretending to have seen none of the extensive reporting about problems with the reflecting pool in the months leading up to Hearn’s arrest, they claim they only first noticed the other damage to the reflecting pool on July 17, when accompanying Hearn’s expert for an inspection of the now-drained pool.
On July 17, 2026, as a defense expert inspected the now-drained Reflecting Pool, United States Attomey Pirro and senior USAO-DC employees once again visited the site and this time immediately noted extensive damage throughout the now-drained pool, It was at that time that USAO-DC first became aware of the significant damage throughout the pool and accordingly requested all documents from DOI concerning the how [sic] the pool was lined and all records regarding the installation of the lining.
Upon seeing the damage, they “accordingly requested all documents from DOI concerning the how [sic] the pool was lined.” DOJ doesn’t explain why that request was successful when the dozens and dozens of communications that prosecutors “made … were made” had not been successful.
Indeed, prosecutors specifically involved in the cases related to the Reflecting Pool made dozens and dozens of communications were made in an effort to identify and obtain the materials necessary to have all information to evaluate the case. After significant demands by USAO-DC, USPP provided the police reports and body-worn camera for roughly 10 individuals associated with the Reflecting Pool.
Nor do they explain why they hadn’t held off on indicting the case until DOI had made that material available in the first place.
That’s their excuse though: They didn’t have access to information on what happened to the pool until after Hearn’s attorney visit and so were helpless to know their case was shit.
And then, they claim, they got 695 megabytes of records which “took days to review,” which is the implicit excuse for letting the case fester two more weeks, from July 17 until July 31.
That visit may actually have been July 16; that’s when Emma Howard, an attorney working with Hearn’s team, describes being taken for a visit in her declaration accompanying a motion to dismiss of the same day, asking to throw out the case because the scene of the crime had been altered.
4. Immediately upon walking due west along the long edge of the pool, I observed that all of the pool liner appeared to be damaged in multiple spots throughout the entirety of the pool This included warping, cracking, peeling, areas where the entire liner was missing, and other forms of damage.
5. AUSA Kevin Reddington accompanied us and showed us the precise location where Mr. Heam allegedly touched the pool liner.
[snip]
7. As can be observed, there is a large oval shaped bald patch at this point running approximately 3.5 feet across.
DOJ discovered this damage (they claim) because Howard documented it — with pictures, which I’ll return to.
Yet during those two weeks and before, the case was already riddled with problems, problems entirely of DOJ’s doing.
The problem that got the most attention was the grand jury testimony from the witness addressing the amount of damage DOJ was trying to pawn off on Hearn.
The very same day this grand jury testimony happened, Pirro gave a big press conference. Ryan Reilly, who knows from covering a zillion January 6 cases that you can only charge a felony for damaging government property if you can prove $1,000 of damage, asked Pirro how she would prove that Hearn did that much damage.
Reilly: Was this part of the pool specifically, was the sealant already partially removed, did he rip it back, can you describe in detail because he maintains that it looks the same as it did…
Let me interrupt here and insist that you watch the video and pay particular attention to the shit going on with Pirro’s mouth while she gets this question.
Reilly: … before he arrived. That’s his —
Pirro: You know, I’m not gonna get into the evidence but what I told you is what our witnesses saw, and experienced, there was an effort — a violent effort! — to rip up the sealant from the bottom of the pool. And irrespective of whether or not, you know, we think that you know there is some situation that preceded it, we can state, and prove, beyond a reasonable doubt, that he caused damage, and that damage is over $1,000.
Reilly: Keying in on that, how do you prove that $1,000 —
Pirro: With an expert. Come to the trial.
Reilly: Does it have to be drained because —
Pirro: We’ll hear all that at the trial.
Reilly: Did he have tools or was it just his bare hands?
Pirro: Right now we believe it’s his bare hands. Both hands.
Reilly: So does that indicate it was probably damaged before or do you believe that he damaged it further.
Pirro: Oh, he damaged it.
Reilly: … Had already been damaged before —
Pirro: He damaged the pool.
Reilly: — before he touched it.
Pirro: He damaged this pool.
Reilly: But there had been all these videos out there —
Pirro: Well good, I’m glad you’ve got that evidence. Cmon in the grand jury you can testify.
That exchange took place at 2:58PM on July 2. Just three hours and one minute earlier, we know from the supplement to Hearn’s bid to get the grand jury testimony, prosecutors reporting to Pirro pulled their expert witness back into the grand jury for a second time.
According to the newly disclosed transcript, the government excused M.R. at 11:36 am Exhibit 3 at 29. Twenty-one minutes later, at 11:57 am, the government recalled MR. and presented the additional testimony that the damage attributable to Mr. Hearn was “definitely” more than $1,000. Id. at 29-30. But by that time, the government should have known that this additional testimony was likely false or misleading, Just minutes before he was excused by government counsel at 11:36 am, M.R. had given testimony establishing that no specific amount of damage was attributable to Mr. Hearn.
That’s what DOJ only decided to turn over belatedly — an oversight, prosecutors claimed. The original portion of the grand jury testimony, however, said this witness testified that you could not separate out the damage Hearn purportedly did from the preexisting damage.
[T]he government’s witness could not identify the repairs necessary to address damage allegedly caused by Mr. Hearn. The witness testified that the repairs at issue would have been necessary regardless of Mr. Hearn’s alleged conduct. Exhibit 1 at 26, 28. The ‘government’s estimated repair range—S6,000 to $15,000—was based on the size of an area, rather than on damage attributed to any particular act by Mr. Hearn. Exhibit 1 at 15, 28. And the government’s witness expressly confirmed that the same estimated range of repairs, $6,000 to $15,000, “would still [have been] necessary before the defendant interacted with the pool.” Exhibit 1 at 28.
Pirro’s witness first testified there was not discrete damage from Hearn to which you could place a $1,000 price tag. Then minutes later, the same witness said Hearn had “definitely” done more than $1,000 in damage. And three hours later, when asked about how DOJ could distinguish pre-existing damage from the damage Hearn purportedly did, Pirro contorted her mouth into a screw and blurted out that a witness — presumably the witness who had just equivocated on precisely this point — would prove that Hearn had done $1,000 in damage.
With all that in mind, check out how Pirro’s prosecutors described — in their attempt to claim they were justified in charging Hearn before they got all those documents from DOI — what must be this witness’ testimony:
W-4, an employee specializing in maintenance and repairs employed by the National Park Service, stated that repairing the additional damage caused to the reflecting pool based on the defendant’s conduct would cost over $1000.
Sure, this witness did state that, but only after they stated, minutes earlier, that there was a whole bunch of other damage and the repairs would have been “necessary before the defendant interacted with the pool.”
Which means the witness testified about all that other damage, the precise thing poor Jeanine Pirro describes being helpless to discover until the pool was drained (as Reilly presciently predicted).
Hearn insisted damage was done “before he arrived,” Reilly noted. The expert witness testified that the repairs were necessary “before” Hearn “interacted with the pool.”
There was also a bitter fight about precisely this chronology starting before July 16 (or 17, if you believe Pirro’s flunkies) and through last week.
On July 9, after Hearn had already publicly explained multiple times the damage was done before he arrived, DOJ seized his phone when he appeared at a status hearing. The next day, his attorneys filed a motion to get it back, based on several complaints. Partly, it was a dickish way to seize the phone (rather than getting his attorneys cooperation to get it), partly, several weeks worth of attorney-client communications were on that phone.
But the biggest complaint was that the affidavit to seize it didn’t mention a key bit of exculpatory evidence: a picture Hearn took before he touched the pool.
the affidavit never mentions a widely published photograph taken by Mr. Hearn before he touched the Reflecting Pool showing that the damage the government has falsely attributed to Mr, Hearn had already taken place. Exhibit A at 3; Exhibit B at 8. The photograph, publicly available since June 20, 2026, eviscerates any probable cause established by the affidavit—and presumably the evidence presented to the Superior Court grand jury that returned the indictment of Mr Hearn.
Before I show you that picture, let me review another point of contention, as reflected in a discovery letter Hearn’s lawyers docketed on Tuesday. In response to a question from attorneys on whether they were satisfied that DOJ had provided the metadata for pictures of the pool, Hearn’s attorneys said, no, they didn’t have acceptable metadata for the pictures of the pool. What they had was an evidentiary shitshow, including a photo obtained from someone else that had no reliable metadata.
In response to your July 27, 2026 email seeking to confirm whether we “received the pictures of the Reflecting Pool with metadata,” we note that the Government has not in fact produced the photographs of the Reflecting Pool with their underlying data.
At USAO-241 through USAO-246, the Government produced screenshots depicting portions of certain on-device application screens-—-namely, Google Photos “Details” panes, an iOS Messages thread, and photo-detail views—from what appear to be at least two different devices: a Google Pixel 7a and an Apple iPhone 14. But screenshots of an application display are not the images” underlying metadata and cannot, by themselves, be authenticated or independently verified. They contain no embedded EXIF or XMP data, file-system timestamps, hash values, or reliable identification of the device owner or user. Accordingly, although the Government has produced screenshots purporting to display metadata, it has not produced the relevant metadata itself.
Moreover, even assuming the accuracy of the dates and times displayed in the screenshots, the information they provide is insufficient to establish the information material to the defense. Several items—-for example, USAO-242 and USAO-246, which are labeled “image000” and reflect “No camera information” and “No lens information”—contain no apparent captured metadata. In addition, the Messages thread produced by the Government indicates that at least one image was For such images, the date and time displayed may reflect when the image was received, downloaded, saved, or otherwise added to the device, rather than when it was originally captured on the source device.
That dispute about metadata is one reason I’m interested in the confident discussion of the metadata of two pictures included in Pirro’s motion to dismiss. One photo was taken by a Parks employee not described to be involved in the confrontation with Hearn at 2:55PM on June 19 (though the motion says it was July because if you still work for Pirro you must be slovenly); the other was taken after Hearn’s arrest, at 4:48PM, by a Parks employee who claimed he yelled at her.
A third NPS employee, W-3, took a photograph of the area where the defendant was seen pulling the lining prior to the incident involving the defendant. Metadata associated with the photo indicates that it was captured at 2:55 PM on July [sic] 19, 2026, shortly before W-1 and W-2 observed the defendant aggressively pulling and further damaging this compromised are of the Reflecting Pool.
[page break then photo]
‘The photograph below was taken by NPS employee W-1 after the incident involving Hearn. Metadata associated with the photo indicates that it was captured on June 19, 2026, at 4:48 PM. A review of USPP body-worn camera shows the officers speaking with the defendant at 4:40 PM
[page break then photo]
As noted, the filing uses a trick my college freshmen might use: sizing the photos such that there was a page break between the description and the photo, meaning you couldn’t easily compare the two photos, before and after.
Here’s what those three photos — the uninvolved Parks employee, Hearn’s photo that didn’t get mentioned in the warrant affidavit, and the Parks employee who claimed he snapped at her — look like (these screen caps include just the damage shown in the pictures), as well as the one a lawyer for Hearn took on July 16:
June 19, 2:55PM, W-3:
June 19 Hearn photo as published by the Beeb on June 21, which was also published on June 20 in the WaPo (hot link).
June 19, 4:48PM, W-1:
Before, during, after. They also show the same goddamn flap of liner.
So does the picture taken by Emma Howard on July 16, though there is added shit visible in the since-drained pool.
DOJ always had in their possession — in the possession of their primary witnesses!! — two photos showing the before and after which, along with Hearn’s photo that had been publicly published, all showed the very same flap of pool liner.
They all showed that all the damage had already been done an hour or more before Hearn arrived at the scene of the crime.
Prosecutors weren’t helpless to know their case was shit before getting the DOI records.
They already had photographic proof that Hearn didn’t do the damage to the pool.
But they charged him anyway.
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