A federal magistrate judge on Monday dismissed a criminal complaint charging two former senior FBI counterintelligence officials with lying to Congress about their roles in the bureau’s Hunter Biden investigation. He said the entire case was politically charged and lacked evidence.
In a scathing, hour-long oral ruling, Magistrate Judge Zia Faruqui rebuked the Justice Department and the FBI for what he called a “slapdash” case that lacked any probable cause that there was evidence Nikki Floris or Bradley Benavides had committed a crime.
“Without motive, without direct evidence, I have nothing,” he said. “It’s not close. It’s nothing.”
“I am deeply troubled by what has happened in this case,” Faruqui said. “What has transpired here can’t be described as anything other than weaponization.”
Although the complaint was dismissed, the Justice Department could still appeal Faruqui’s ruling to the chief judge or seek a grand jury indictment.
CBS News has reached out to the Justice Department, the FBI and the D.C. U.S. Attorney’s Office for comment.
Floris was a former top intelligence analyst in charge at the bureau’s Washington Field Office, while Benavides was the former deputy assistant director at the FBI’s Counterintelligence Division. The two embraced outside the courtroom after the decision as Floris cried tears of relief.
They were flanked by numerous former senior Justice Department and FBI officials who had come to support them, including former Acting FBI Director Brian Driscoll and Steve Jensen, the former head of the FBI’s Washington Field Office.
“This case should have never been brought,” said Margaret Donovan, one of Floris’ attorneys, in a statement to reporters outside the courthouse. “This was a slapdash complaint, spaghetti at the wall, Hunter Biden conspiracy fever dream. But facts still matter in a courtroom.”
The criminal case against Floris and Benavides has been highly unusual since it first came to light earlier this month.
Prosecutors charged the pair in a criminal complaint, a charging document that is generally only used in felony cases that pose exigent public safety or national security threats. Usually, prosecutors secure a grand jury indictment before filing charges.
After midnight on the eve of the court hearing’s first day last Tuesday, prosecutors used an unsigned and unsworn superseding complaint to try to add new charges of obstructing Congress — a maneuver the magistrate judge said was improper and unheard of.
Faruqui struck the superseding complaint from the record, saying it lacked proper judicial review. But he allowed the hearing on the original complaint to proceed in a marathon evidentiary proceeding with three days of testimony that culminated in Monday’s extraordinary decision.
Throughout those three days, FBI Special Agent Bryan Witt, who was assigned to help investigate the matter, candidly acknowledged to the court that the case had not been handled like any other in his career.
He testified that it was opened at the behest of FBI Director Kash Patel just one day after President Donald Trump gave a televised speech in July where he accused intelligence officials of engaging in a coverup to hide China’s interference in the 2020 election and ordered the Justice Department to pursue prosecutions. Throughout the investigation, senior officials including the FBI’s deputy directors and Patel himself checked on the progress.
Witt also acknowledged that he feared it might be viewed as political and that others in his FBI field office in Kansas City were concerned it was a witch hunt.
Faruqui, a former federal prosecutor himself, at one point also quoted aloud from the Justice Department Manual, which stipulates that prosecutors should not take overt investigative or prosecutorial steps intended to affect or influence the outcome of an election.
“Why did this have to be charged in October 2026?” he asked out loud, noting there was no concern with the statute of limitations expiring in the near future.
“There was simply no other event on the calendar, except for the midterm elections,” he said. He added that he refused to bury his head in the sand and pretend the timing was not an issue.
“I will not lobotomize myself in this way,” he added.
