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June 3, 2026 / 10:12 PM EDT
/ CBS News
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The Southern Poverty Law Center asked a federal judge on Wednesday to consider sanctioning federal prosecutors, after the Justice Department shared an unsigned and unstamped copy of a superseding indictment against the nonprofit with members of the media.On Tuesday, the Justice Department announced it had obtained a superseding indictment against the SPLC that contained some new allegations about how it allegedly used donations to infiltrate hate groups, claiming the money helped buy materials for cross burnings and for Ku Klux Klan robes and hats.The new indictment does not name any additional defendants. It still contains 11 counts of wire fraud, bank fraud and conspiracy to commit money laundering, the same charges that were outlined in the original April indictment accusing the SPLC of paying informants in extremist groups without disclosing the practice to donors or banks.The SPLC's attorneys alleged in court filings Wednesday that the unofficial copy of the superseding indictment was improperly shared with journalists before it was publicly docketed, in violation of federal grand jury secrecy rules. They asked the judge to order the Justice Department to provide an explanation for its conduct and explain why prosecutors on the case should not face sanctions.The Justice Department "released an unsigned, unstamped Microsoft Word version of a draft superseding indictment to members of the media—before unsealing any legitimate filing and before alerting (or providing a copy to) defense counsel," the SPLC said, adding the department was putting "putting media strategy before the sacrosanct rules on grand jury secrecy."The group's lawyers wrote that revealing information about the case before it is formally made public could prejudice the SPLC by creating a "one-sided narrative that the SPLC could not address without compounding the harm."
