Frank Parlato
The federal trial began in Brooklyn of Rachel Cherwitz and Nicole Daedone on May 5, 2025.
The charge was conspiracy to commit forced labor “by means of force, threats of force, and serious harm.” It ended in a conviction in June.
There was no charge of forced labor—only conspiracy, purportedly carried out through “schemes, plans, and patterns.” No force was described. No weapons. No threats. No bruises. No labor. Just a conspiracy to do something bad.
Judge Diane Gujarati ordered the detention of defendants Cherwitz and Daedone following their conviction. They were remanded to the Brooklyn Metropolitan Detention Center, despite not being sentenced.
Judicial Control and a One-Sided Story
Throughout the trial, Gujarati’s rulings favored one side. She had been a prosecutor for 21 years. Key decisions resulted in a jury hearing only the government’s version. In the courtroom, the judge shaped the story, excluding defense evidence that could have undermined the prosecution.
People think trials are about truth. But sometimes they’re about what’s left out. And these two women, whatever they did or didn’t do, didn’t get the whole story told. This was not the rule of law. It was the rule of outcome.
The Presence of Power and the Fear
What is less discussed—is the pressure on her. Some said she lacked temperament. Some say she was biased. But there was something more.
On numerous ccasions, federal prosecutors and FBI agents packed her courtroom as she deliberated key decisions.
The presence was not incidental. It may have signaled institutional intimidation—an assertion of dominance over the judiciary. Judge Gujarati looked like someone cornered.
At its extreme, one day, twenty prosecutors lined the pews. Another day, twenty agents from the FBI, waiting on her ruling about one of their own—Agent Elliot McGinnis.
Fear, and Unfitness
People say she isn’t fit to be a judge. But it was something else. Something sadder. She was afraid. Not of the facts. Not of the law. Of them. The prosecutors. The agents. The system itself.
Twenty U.S. attorneys came to her courtroom, just to watch her rule. Twenty FBI agents the next time, when their own were on the line. She may have worn the robe. But they ran the room.
They sent twenty prosecutors to her courtroom. Not to be heard. Just to be seen. Just to stand there. They didn’t have to blackmail her. They could just exist. Crowd the courtroom. Loom.
She was terrified. Not corrupt. Just cornered. And they loved it.
She wore the robe. They ran the script.
Presence as Pressure, Not Process
Just consider it again: The Eastern District U.S. Attorney’s Office sent twenty prosecutors to court the day she had a major decision to make. Another day? Twenty FBI agents filled the benches when she had to rule on whether their corrupt agent, McGinnis, would be forced to testify.
That wasn’t a show of respect. That was a show of control. She got the message: This was their courtroom. They could make her life hell. Her authority was conditional.
The justice system, as it is currently structured, permits such intimidation without ever requiring a direct threat.
It was in a way forced labor conspiracy. They conspired to make Gujarati rule the way she did. It is the management of fear. She gave them everything. Every ruling. Every exclusion. Every silence.
She spent two decades working for prosecutors—so when they packed her courtroom, she didn’t see it as intimidation. She saw it as instruction. Judge Gujarati was a guest in her own courtroom.
Twenty prosecutors show up one day. Not for fun. Not for coffee. They were there to make her feel it. And twenty FBI agents show up. All quiet. All watching. She helped them win. Of course she did. That’s what scared people do.
They sent twenty prosecutors to glare. Then twenty agents to loom. She was smart enough to know how bad they could screw her life up. And they knew she knew.
So she did what they expected. She cleared the path, swept it clean, and handed the jury only what the government wished them to see. It was survival instinct in a black robe.
Obedience in Robes
One day, this case will be overturned. And when it is, I hope we remember the woman on the bench was not malicious. She was just afraid. When the verdict is reversed, I hope they go easy on her. She was a scared woman in a hard room. She just did what scared people do: obeyed.
She was never meant to be a judge. She didn’t have the spine for it. And when the verdict is tossed and everyone’s pretending justice prevailed—Don’t be too hard on her. She didn’t destroy justice. She just didn’t protect it.
When this case is overturned, don’t waste your anger on her. She shouldn’t have worn the robe. She should’ve stayed where she was: part of the team.
The Weaponization of Language
This case was never about crime. It was about making an example. And the government used language:
“Conspiracy.” “Scheme.” “Pattern.”
“Conspiracy” stood in for action. “Scheme” replaced conduct.
Euphemisms for nothing happened.
This is how authoritarian logic enters liberal courts.
A Screamer
Attorney Jennifer Bonjean represented Nicole Daedone.
Judge Gujarati screamed at Bonjean for demanding that evidence be admitted. Everyone in that courtroom knew what it meant. Gujarati panicked. And Gujarati screamed. Like a cornered animal. Because deep down, she knew— Evidence meant acquittal. And she couldn’t face that.
And in that moment, everybody saw it. She was terrified.
They sent twenty prosecutors to stare her down. Then twenty FBI agents to finish the job. When this thing gets overturned—and it will—cut her some slack.
She wasn’t evil.She was in the wrong chair.
Scared people don’t make good judges.
Frank Parlato is an investigative journalist, media strategist, publisher, and legal consultant.
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That Judge is a c u next tuesday
Thank you for your excellent articles on this case. In my business some companies advertise for “interns”, kids accept, and later say “Wait a minute! I’m fetching coffee and photocopying and mailing scripts! Other people doing this work here are getting paid.” What this illustrates is that, per The Statute of Frauds, employment situations need to be clear and in writing up front, and employees should show up and work at the service of their supervisors. People who volunteer for civic and cultural organizations do a lot of office work that in the end doesn’t do them any good (except perhaps to become better phone answerers and typists and filers and coffee makers) but the entire premise is that they are performing these menial tasks for the benefit of an organization they believe in, and that they will derive some self-improvement from. it. No one is going to say, “I volunteered to do clerical work for the Getty Museum but that didn’t make me a better artist — or even teach me much about art.”
Of course the “conspiracy to” in the charges is a modern catchall for anything the government wants to throw in. It’s not that the defendants actually forced anyone to perform “labor” against their will. It’s that they conspired to do so. If I discuss with a friend ways we can cut our taxes but don’t actually follow though on any of the things we talked about am I guilty of conspiracy to commit tax fraud? This can be taken to extremes, up to and including conspiracy to overthrow the government based on a purely hypothetical, ideological and abstruse conversation.
Meanwhile Nicole and Rachel should be free now. I am certain that these convictions will be reversed on appeal.
Yeah except it’s clear from the trial transcripts that they DID order their employees to do unsavory things – like give handjobs to investors. So your imaginary hypotheticals to try and downplay the truth of what actually happened in this case don’t really hold up. Nice try, tho. Nic and RC are exactly where they belong right now.
Oh No! Someone asked me to give a handjob and I said yes. Hope they get 20 years in prison! Wild Take
Excellent article Frank, very eye opening for sure and very concerning. It’s appalling that this is allowed to happen, and goes on without any intervention, without checks and balances or anything close. This is our justice system? What a Fucking shame
Thank you for continuing on this case, Frank. The convictions come out and the world wants to just want to bury the nuance, the questions. We want to trust that the system works, that we can put the issue to bed, and that history has been written.
From my brief visits to Gujarati’s courtroom, I share many of these concerns. Evidentiary decisions even leading up to the trial itself were questionable and as the trial progressed, even more troubling. As has been noted here and in several conversations around town, Gujarati’s proposal that defense witnesses’ testimony should be inadmissable unless they had spent “24 hours, 7 days a week” is an impossible standard, far beyond the “reasonable” deliberations a jury member is asked to make. The result is a one-sided presentation of the facts, undercutting the core principles of our judicial system.
My assumption is Gujarati hoped that by remanding Daedone and Cherwitz, the inertia of their incarceration may prevail and indeed these various troubling decision may eventually end up under the rug. But I imagine she does not sleep well at night and that this case will hang over her for quite some time. And for my own sleep, I fear for the precedent these decisions may set and against whom they may next be exercised.
Appellate reversal is obviously a long and extraordinary remedy but in the aftermath of such a fiasco, I set my hope: Fiat justitia ruat caelum
-J
The defense wanted to put up a bunch of current OT sycophants (who weren’t even at OT in the time period during the crimes) to sing Nicole and Rachel’s praises which would tell the jury nothing meaningful about the case at hand, but sure, tell yourself whatever you need to. Why wasn’t Maddie put on the stand? Couldn’t she have refuted *three* of the witnesses if her account was dissimilar? Oh, maybe she could’t refute those witnesses, after all.
Or where was Alisha? She was around when many of these events took place, and the judge would have surely admitted her testimony as relevant. Or would she have had to tell the truth under oath about facts from the past that only made the defense’s case worse? What about Yia? Justine? Eli? Or any of the other hundred or more people who lived 24/7 in The Warehouse and/or 1080 and/or in the Morelino and/or in The Bunker during the relevant time period? Why weren’t any of them subpoenaed by the defense to come forward and tell the truth?
For that matter, why didn’t Nicole follow through on her promise to testify on her own behalf so she could set the record straight?
Don’t you wonder any of these things?
I know you’re a latecomer to the party who’s bummed that the party is over, but rest assured, any more truth that would have been revealed by relevant witnesses would not have helped the defendants. If the case seems unfairly “one sided”, it’s because the relevant facts and evidence support the truth that you and way too many others refuse to accept: that for well over ten years, Nic & RC colluded to abuse vulnerable people by exploiting them for labor, for money, for status, and that they knew damn well (but didn’t give af) that their enrichment was acquired via the exploitation, harm, and impoverishment of others.
She’s going to give them max time in Sept. One angry judge who punishes freedoms of speech and press.
telling slaves to give your investors a handjob is not free speech
Fuck you. Frank, you fucking faggot! You took down my company.