Paul Abbate, who as the FBI’s longtime deputy director had been expected to replace Director Christopher Wray on an acting basis, is retiring, reports the Associated Press . Abbate had been expected to run the FBI during Senate confirmation proceedings for Kash Patel, President Trump’s choice for director. It was not immediately clear who would fill that role. Abbate said that "with new leadership inbound, after nearly four years in the deputy role, I am departing the FBI today,” Abbate wrote. Abbate’s abrupt departure after 28 years with the FBI creates additional tumult for an agency that had already been preparing for upheaval if Patel is confirmed. A Trump loyalist, Patel has repeatedly criticized FBI leadership and decision-making and has alarmed Democrats with statements suggesting that he would be willing to use the FBI to exact retribution on Trump adversaries. Abbate held a variety of positions at the FBI, including head of the bureau’s Detroit and Washington, D.C., field offices and executive assistant director for the criminal, cyber, response and services branch. He was named deputy director, the No. 2 position responsible for the FBI’s investigative activities, in 2018. Wray was named by Trump during his first term and had been director for more than seven years. Wray announced his retirement last month, more than a week after Trump said he wanted Patel to be the director.

A juror in a Monroe County, N.Y., drug case let his thoughts about a prosecutor be known in a tweet. "I don’t know how much I’m allowed to tweet about the trial I’m sitting on, but at risk of a mistrial, the assistant D.A. prosecuting it is smoking hot," the tweet said. Within a day, he was booted from the jury, reports the Rochester Democrat & Chronicle. The tweet made its way to a thread on Reddit. From there, the Monroe County Public Defender's Office and Assigned Counsel Office were alerted by readers of Reddit. Officials were able to determine the source of the tweet and alerted the judge, who removed the juror. Juries typically have alternates at the ready to step in if a juror falls ill or is removed. Some saw the tweet as an ingenious way to be removed from a jury. Across the U.S., social media has become problematic with criminal cases and judges typically implore jurors to avoid social media during a trial. A New York State Bar Association report cited a questionnaire in which "46% of participants said they would search for a defendant on social media if they were serving on a jury." Mark Funk, who heads the county's assigned counsel program, said the local episode showed that the legal defense community bands together. His first call about the Tweet came from someone in another county. From there, the two defense lawyers on the case alerted the judge and "worked together to make sure their clients received a fair trial," he said. There were two defendants accused of drug possession. On Thursday, they were acquitted by the jury of all charges.

Indigenous activist Leonard Peltier will return home a half century after he was imprisoned for the 1975 killings of two FBI agents. Outgoing President Biden commuted Peltier’s sentence Monday after decades of advocacy calling his imprisonment an example of the U.S. government’s mistreatment of Native Americans. The White House said Peltier, now 80 and in declining health, will move to home confinement. The commutation is not a pardon for crimes committed, a decision some advocates welcomed because he has maintained his innocence. The commutation angered law enforcement officers who believe he is guilty, reports the Associated Press. The National Congress of American Indians celebrated the “historic” decision, saying the case “has long symbolized the systemic injustices faced by Indigenous Peoples.” In a private letter to Biden, former FBI director Christopher Wray reiterated his position that “Peltier is a remorseless killer,” and urged the president not to act. “Granting Peltier any relief from his conviction or sentence is wholly unjustified and would be an affront to the rule of law,” Wray wrote. Peltier was active in the American Indian Movement, which has fought police brutality and discrimination against Native Americans since the 1960s. In 1973, the movement took over the village of Wounded Knee on Pine Ridge — the Oglala Lakota Nation’s reservation in South Dakota —starting a 71-day standoff with federal agents. Peltier has admitted he was firing during the June 26, 1975, confrontation with FBI agents who went to Pine Ridge to serve arrest warrants. Agents Jack Coler and Ronald Williams were shot in the head at close range. AIM member Joseph Stuntz also was killed. Peltier fled to Canada but was extradited to the U.S. and convicted on two counts of first-degree murder. He was sentenced to life in prison in 1977, despite defense claims of falsified evidence. The Bureau of Prisons said Peltier was in the federal Coleman prison in Florida. Peltier’s lawyer said his release was tentatively set for Feb. 18.