Judge holds ex-DHB chief in contempt of court

In a scathing ruling Monday, a federal judge cited body-armor magnate David Brooks for contempt of court for refusing to hand over a verifiable computer history of an e-mail that federal prosecutors alleged was forged in an attempt to undermine their key witness.

The e-mail supposedly showed that the government witness, Dawn Schlegel, the former chief financial officer of Brooks' then Westbury-based company, DHB Industries, lied during testimony in which she said that she had had only a one-night stand with a male colleague at a time when she and her husband were having marital difficulties.

Both Schlegel, who ended her testimony Monday after 23 days on the witness stand, and federal prosecutor Christopher Ott have suggested that the e-mail is a forgery.

The ruling means that Brooks will now have to face three trials: the current one on charges of looting his company; then a trial for alleged income tax evasion on millions of dollars he received from DHB; and now the trial on contempt of court.

U.S. District Judge Joanna Seybert had repeatedly ordered Brooks and his attorneys to turn over the metadata, or actual computer history, of the e-mail.

But while they initially said they would, they repeatedly have declined to do so and produced only what she called "two mysterious pieces of paper" purporting to be the history, whose authenticity could not be verified, Seybert said.

One of Brooks' attorneys, Richard Levitt, had argued two weeks ago that the e-mail was legitimate, saying, "I wonder whether or not . . . when the court sees that this is not a phony document, we will have an apology from the government for publicly proclaiming on numerous occasions that it is a phony document."

The "mysterious printout," as Seybert also called the supposed metadata she received, was produced, in effect, without a willingness to say where it came from, who has had custody of it, or from what computer it originated from, Seybert wrote.

"The court is tired of giving Mr. Brooks second and third chances to comply with its instructions," she wrote, saying he was acting "contemptuously."

Most recently, Brooks and his attorneys have claimed that he is protected from having to turn over the metadata by various privileges including those under the Fifth Amendment against self-incrimination and the secrecy of the attorney-client relationship.

But Seybert said those arguments were "frivolous" because a judge has a right to know in secret, as she had asked, where documents originated that were being entered into a trial.

Defense attorney Levitt declined to comment on the judge's ruling, as did federal prosecutor Ott.