By Frank G. Runyeon

Law360, New York (June 26, 2020, 4:51 PM EDT ) A Brooklyn federal prison on Friday failed to produce a New York woman for her arraignment on charges of firebombing an occupied NYPD vehicle in May during protests against police violence, leaving attorneys wondering why she didn't appear.

Officials at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn were apparently incommunicado ahead of Samantha Shader's arraignment, defense counsel and the court clerk said Friday morning as Eastern District prosecutors and a federal defender waited in vain for the jail to remotely connect the Catskills woman. Shader is jailed on charges that she threw a Molotov cocktail into a police vehicle with four officers inside — charges similar to those filed against a now-suspended Pryor Cashman LLP associate and another attorney who allegedly firebombed an empty vandalized NYPD car.

After 45 minutes of waiting, a clerk for Chief Magistrate Judge Cheryl L. Pollak apologized and said the arraignment would have to be rescheduled.

On Friday the Bureau of Prisons declined to explain why MDC Brooklyn failed to produce Shader, saying in a statement that "for privacy reasons, we do not discuss legal matters for specific inmates."

According to Deirdre von Dornum of the Federal Defenders for the Eastern District of New York, the prison's legal team said there was an "institutional emergency" on Thursday morning that led to cancellations of all MDC inmate court appearances Thursday and sporadic cancellations on Friday.

On Saturday, BOP spokesperson Sue Allison confirmed to Law360 that "there is an ongoing investigation at MDC Brooklyn resulting in modified operations to ensure the safety of staff and inmates. As the investigation is in process, we decline to comment further."

BOP did not respond to a detailed list of questions sent by Law360 on Saturday seeking further information on the nature of both the emergency and the investigation.

Counsel for the prison "has communicated with both the court and inmate Shader's attorney and the arraignment is being rescheduled for a future date," the BOP said Friday.

Shader's attorney did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Shader, 27, is accused of firebombing a police vehicle with four officers inside. Prosecutors claim a bystander's video shows Shader lighting a Molotov cocktail and throwing it at the police van.

"The Molotov cocktail shattered two windows of the NYPD vehicle on impact and caused internal damage to the NYPD vehicle. The officers were able to escape the vehicle before being seriously injured," prosecutors said in a June 1 letter seeking her detention. Police who saw her throw the bottle, the government said, chased after her and arrested her. Prosecutors claim she bit one of the officers.

Shader has been held at MDC in the weeks following her May 29 arrest.

According to the seven-count indictment, Shader faces charges including use of explosives, arson, use of explosives to commit a felony, arson conspiracy, use of a destructive device, civil disorder and making or possessing a destructive device. If convicted on all of the charges, Shader faces a mandatory minimum of 45 years in prison with the possibility of a life sentence.

Last week, Shader's attorney demanded information about the Central Islip grand jury and moved to dismiss the indictment — as federal defenders have in a host of other cases — saying the group that indicted her was tainted by improper demographics because of COVID-19 restrictions on New York City boroughs in place earlier in June.

U.S. District Judge Dora Lizette Irizarry set a July 2 date for the government to respond to the motion for grand jury records, but swatted away the motion to dismiss the indictment as "insufficient," noting the request needed to be supported by a memo or grounds for dismissal.

"If defendant seeks to dismiss the indictment, defendant must do so properly," the judge ruled.

In a separate Molotov incident, which the government claims unfolded just 15 minutes before Shader's alleged attack, prosecutors claim attorneys Colinford Mattis, a now-suspended associate at Pryor Cashman, and Urooj Rahman, a tenant lawyer at Bronx Legal Services, firebombed a vacant, vandalized NYPD car.

Mattis and Rahman face a near-identical indictment for their alleged attack on the empty car as Shader does for her alleged attack on the occupied police van. Mattis pled not guilty at his arraignment, which was mobbed with 300 listeners and supporters who called out to him. Rahman's arraignment is scheduled for Monday.

The two attorneys are currently jailed pending the outcome of a bail appeal to the Second Circuit after a magistrate judge's ruling, upheld by U.S. District Judge Margo K. Brodie, granted home confinement with electronic monitoring on $250,000 in surety bonds secured by six or more family and friends. Mattis was rearrested when the government won a stay from the appellate court.

After the aborted arraignment on Friday, a court official told Law360 in the early evening that Shader's arraignment had not been rescheduled yet.

The government is represented by Jonathan Algor and Ian Richardson of the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of New York.

Shader is represented by Amanda L. David of the Federal Defenders of New York.

Mattis is represented by Sabrina P. Shroff.

Rahman is represented by Paul Shechtman of Bracewell LLP.

The cases are US v. Shader, case number 1:20-cr-00202, and U.S. v. Mattis et al., case number 1:20-cr-00203, in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York.

--Editing by Amy Rowe.

UPDATE: This story has been updated with information about the investigation at MDC Brooklyn.

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