Trial For Kavanaugh’s Attempted Assassin Set for June ’25
A trial date was set Tuesday for a 28-year-old California man who has been accused of plotting to kill Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh.
Nicholas Roske will be tried June 9, 2025, in a date set by Maryland U.S. District Judge Peter Messitte, The Hill reported. Roske appeared alongside his attorneys in federal court in Greenbelt, Maryland, on Tuesday, his first appearance in court in nearly two years. He has been detained without bond since his arrest on June 8, 2022, on a charge of attempting to assassinate a justice of the United States.
If convicted, Roske faces a maximum sentence of life in federal prison.
Prosecutors said they expect the trial will last about a week.
“Selecting the jury in this case might take a little longer,” federal prosecutor Kathleen Gavin told The Hill, noting the high-profile nature of the case.
A search of Roske’s luggage after his arrest turned up a 9mm Glock 17 pistol with two magazines and ammunition, a black tactical chest rig, a knife, pepper spray, zip ties, a hammer, a crowbar, and duct tape, according to court documents viewed by Newsmax. In a post-arrest interview with police, Roske reportedly said he was upset about the leak of the draft decision that ultimately ended the federal right to an abortion and the recent school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, as well as the possibility that Kavanaugh would vote to loosen gun control laws.
Andrew Szekely, one of Roske’s public defenders, said at Tuesday’s hearing that most of his client’s pretrial defense is likely to focus on preventing those statements from coming in at trial, The Hill reported. Other potential motions include ones related to suppressing searches of his phone and social media accounts, Szekely said.
Two weeks after Roske’s arrest, Kavanaugh voted with the 6-3 majority in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. v. Bruen that determined the Second Amendment’s guarantee of the right to keep and bear arms protects a broad right to carry a handgun outside the home for self-defense.
“Roske stated that he began thinking about how to give his life purpose and decided that he would kill the Supreme Court Justice after finding the Justice’s Montgomery County address on the internet,” court documents showed. “Roske further indicated that he had purchased the Glock pistol and other items for the purpose of breaking into the Justice’s residence and killing the Justice as well as himself.”
