The Ministry of Justice officially revokes the Adams case, the second Southern District prosecutor resigns.

On Friday morning, an assistant prosecutor in the Southern District of New York submitted his resignation. This comes as the second resignation of a prosecutor in the Southern District, following the resignation of prosecutor Danielle Sassoon, who had filed corruption charges against Mayor Adams the day before. Later on Friday, the Justice Department officially moved to dismiss the federal charges against Adams.

According to multiple media reports, the assistant prosecutor named Hagan Scotten wrote a letter to the Justice Department’s second-in-command Emil Bove, resigning and criticizing the directive from the Justice Department to drop the litigation against New York City Mayor Adams.

“I expect that you will eventually find someone foolish enough or weak enough to make your motion. But I absolutely will not be that person,” Scotten wrote.

Like Sassoon, Scotten is a conservative. He previously served as a clerk for Supreme Court Justice John Roberts and had also served in the U.S. Army in Iraq, earning two Bronze Star Medals before attending Harvard Law School.

In his resignation letter, Scotten wrote, “No free society with rule of law can permit the government to solicit a relaxation of charges or threaten reindictment to incentivize elected officials to support its policy goals.”

Meanwhile, Sassoon revealed to the public that on January 31, 2025, she was present in her office at a meeting with Adams’ attorney and Bove where Adams’ attorney repeatedly pushed for a plea deal, saying that “only with the dismissal of charges, Adams could help law enforcement”.

However, Mayor’s attorney Alex Spiro denied any quid pro quo, calling Sassoon’s statements “outright lies”.

According to The Washington Post, several other attorneys have resigned due to the Justice Department’s decision to drop the case, but on Friday, Acting Deputy Attorney General Bove manually signed a motion seeking the dismissal of corruption charges against Adams, leaving the fate of the case in the hands of federal judges.

On Thursday, President Trump told reporters that he had “no knowledge whatsoever” about the Justice Department withdrawing the Adams case.