Federal prosecutors will not be allowed to reopen the criminal case against Cliven Bundy

Federal prosecutors will not be allowed to reopen the criminal case against Cliven Bundy, his sons or supporters, U.S. District Judge Gloria Navarro has ruled."It's the final nail in the coffin, and completely expected," Bundy attorney Bret Whipple said. He called the 11-page ruling "a direct rebuke to the federal government, the Bureau of Land Management and the different prosecuting agencies."The criminal case was filed in 2016 against Bundy, his sons and 14 others, after a standoff in April 2014 against the Bureau of Land Management on Bundy’s Bunkerville, Nev., Ranch. The protest involved hundreds of armed Bundy supporters who prevented BLM agents from enforcing court orders to roundup and remove Bundy’s cattle from government land.Last week’s ruling preventing the reopening of the case comes after Judge Navarro dismissed charges in January due to “flagrant misconduct” by prosecutors. Navarro said again in last week’s ruling that that prosecutors "willfully" failed to disclose to defense lawyers evidence that government agents provoked the Bundy family into calling supporters to their defense by acts "such as the insertion and positioning of snipers and cameras surveilling the Bundy home."Navarro said she found no reason to reconsider her dismissal of charges in January against Bundy, sons Ryan and Ammon Bundy and Montana militia leader Ryan Payne."On the contrary," Navarro, a 2010 appointee of President Barack Obama wrote, "a universal sense of justice was violated by the government's failure to provide evidence that is potentially exculpatory."