Government lawyers fear that mentioning the mass surveillance whistleblower in Adel Daoud’s case could bias jurors against prosecution evidence

This article is more than 5 years old

This article is more than 5 years old

Prosecutors want a federal judge in a Chicago terrorism case to prohibit the defence from mentioning Edward Snowden at a 21-year-old suspect’s upcoming trial.

The government filing is in Adel Daoud’s case. He has pleaded not guilty to trying to set off a bomb outside a Chicago bar.

An appeals court in 2014 denied a defence request to go through foreign intelligence surveillance court (Fisa) records on Daoud. The defence had argued the records could help with trial preparation.

It was Snowden who disclosed how that court secretly approved expanded US surveillance methods.

Prosecutors worry the defence could seek to blurt out Snowden’s name and related topics at Daoud’s trial in July. They say the defence shouldn’t be able “to encourage the jury to disregard the evidence because of the means of collection”.