Bridgegate defense lawyers say they want to review other email accounts, not just Gov. Christie's cell phone.
NEWARK -- Although most of the recent focus in the Bridgegate case has been on the inability of Gov. Chris Christie or the lawyers representing his office to account for whereabouts of the cell phone he used in 2013, attorneys for the defendants are also asking questions about the governor's personal email accounts.
Lawyers for Bridgegate defendants Bill Baroni and Bridget Anne Kelly contend that information possibly critical to their legal defense -- including emails from an account for Christie and his wife Mary Pat -- have been either withheld or not even looked at by by Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, the law firm representing the governor's office.
After months of briefs being filed on both sides, the two parties will square off in federal court Thursday morning over Gibson Dunn's motion to quash in part the defense's subpoena for more records, including the governor's emails and cell phone.
In one brief from mid-June, attorneys for Baroni, the former deputy executive director of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, says he should have access to "at least two personal, non-governmental email accounts over which (Christie) conducted state business."
As evidence, the attorneys cited a Dec. 14, 2013, email from the Christie joint marital account to then-Port Authority Chairman David Samson referring to a newspaper story about Bridgegate testimony in a state investigation.
"Does anyone really believe that this is the only Bridgegate-related email the governor sent or received from this personal and undisclosed email account?" said Baroni's attorney, Michael Baldassare.
The email was not initially turned over by Gibson Dunn in response to a defense subpoena, the lawyers say.
Gibson Dunn in its reply said its lawyers "understood" that Christie conducted no state business on the joint email account, and therefore never searched it during its initial investigation. After Baroni brought up the joint account in a filing on June 13, Gibson Dunn said it reviewed the account for the first time and found nothing other than the email to Samson.
The Gibson Dunn filing says it had previously reviewed Christie's own personal email account and produced to the defense any materials "relating to and contemporaneous with the lane closures" at the George Washington Bridge.
Gibson Dunn attorney Randy Mastro did not reply to an NJ Advance Media question about the email accounts.
It also is unclear in Gibson Dunn's filing if it searched for materials only from Sept. 9, 2013, to Sept. 13, 2013 -- "contemporaneous" to with the days of the alleged politically motivated access lane closures at the George Washington Bridge--or in the following week and months as the investigation unfolded.
Baldassare, Baroni's lawyer, said the combination of the missing cell phone, the failure to examine the joint email account and the earlier theft of a computer hard drive by former Port Authority official David Wildstein, who pleaded guilty to Bridgegate charges, show that the evidence process may be tainted.
"It's not just about this email," he said. "It's about missing phones, deleted texts, stolen hard drives, and secret email accounts. These discoveries show that this prosecution is fatally and irreparably flawed."
The defense wants the cell phones because data show that Christie and former head of the Authorities unit Regina Egea texted each other during testimony by Port Authority Executive Director Patrick Foye in the state Bridgegate investigation.
The 12 texts were later deleted, although the defense wants to see if it can recover them if the phone is located.
Baron and Kelly face a number of charges related to the closing off of the access lanes in Fort Lee to the bridge, allegedly as political retribution for Mayor Mark Sokolich's refusal to endorse Christie's re-election.
Tim Darragh may be reached at tdarragh@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @timdarragh. Find NJ.com on Facebook.