By Steve Neavling
A federal judge lashed out an FBI agent whose failure to disclose evidence in a bank robbery case in New York led to a mistrial.
FBI Special Agent Paul Scuzzarella said he “forgot” to provide 199 pages of forensic laboratory evidence to federal prosecutors, The Times Union reports.
Saying she was “livid” at the agent’s actions, U.S. District Judge Mae D’Agostino declared a mistrial on the eve of the final day of testimony in the case of Ulysses Walls, 29, who is accused of armed robberies of banks in Albany and North Greenbush in 2019.
A retrial has been scheduled for Feb. 21.
“I want you to know, Agent Scuzzarella, that you are responsible for the position the court finds itself in,” D’Agostino told the agent. “Negligence, ineptitude, carelessness, failure to do what you needed to do is going to result in another trial where these bank tellers are going to have to come in and relive what happened to them at two separate banks. Thousands of dollars of resources have already been spent for this trial to be conducted — and it’s on you. And I don’t know if you fully understand precisely the position you have put this court in.”
The judge added: “You should be embarrassed by your conduct.”
While the judge questioned the agent under oath on Dec. 15, Scuzzarella said he thought he had disclosed all of the evidence but was mistaken.
“It’s on me that I apparently did not review everything and realized that this particular stuff was not included. And then I think just, over time, I forgot it was even done,” he stated.
