Wisconsin Club for Growth sues to shut down John Doe investigation
By Patrick Marley and Jason Stein of the Journal Sentinel Updated: 1:57 p.m.
Madison — A conservative group and its director sued a judge and prosecutors Monday in federal court in an attempt to shut down a secret investigation of campaign fund-raising and spending in Wisconsin's recent recalls.
In a filing with the U.S. District Court in Milwaukee, the Wisconsin Club for Growth and its director, Eric O'Keefe, argued the probe violates group members' rights to free speech, free assembly and equal protection under the law.
The civil rights lawsuit asked the court to enjoin prosecutors from continuing the John Doe probe, relieve O'Keefe and the Wisconsin Club for Growth from having to cooperate with it and order prosecutors to pay them compensatory damages for violating their constitutional rights.
Some of what they are seeking has been blacked out, as have other long sections of the 76-page complaint they filed because of secrecy orders issued in the probe.
"This secret investigation and gag order on conservative activists is intended to stop their political successes in Wisconsin," O'Keefe said in a statement. "The state cannot be allowed to silence political speech it does not like."
Named as defendants are Reserve Judge Gregory A. Peterson, who is overseeing the investigation; special prosecutor Francis Schimtz; Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm; Assistant District Attorney Bruce Landgraf; Assistant District Attorney David Robles; and investigator Dean Nickel.
The suit portrays the ongoing investigation, as well as a years-long probe that preceded it, as out-of-control affairs fueled by political bias. It accuses the prosecutors of engaging in "intimidating behavior and harassment."
"These extraordinary circumstances call for extraordinary action from the federal judiciary," says the complaint filed by O'Keefe attorney David Rivkin of Washington, D.C.
It is the second attempt to ask a court to halt the probe. Three unnamed petitioners asked the state Court of Appeals in November to stop the investigation on technical grounds,
but the three-judge panel last month unanimously declined to do so.
Sources have said prosecutors are looking at whether groups such as the Wisconsin Club for Growth coordinated illegally with GOP candidates during the 2011 and 2012 recall races. In the most prominent contest, Gov. Scott Walker in June 2012 became the first governor in the country's history to win a recall election.
Republican political strategist R.J. Johnson has hinted very strongly that he is a focus of the investigation. Johnson is a consultant both for Walker's campaign and the Wisconsin Club for Growth.
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