WaPo:
Federal judges say unsolicited pizza deliveries to jurists’ homes that began in February may number in the hundreds across at least seven states, prompting increased security concerns and a demand from a Senate leader for a Justice Department investigation.
Many of the deliveries have gone to judges presiding over lawsuits challenging the Trump administration’s policies. The U.S. Marshals Service has been tracking the deliveries, and judges have been sharing details about their experiences in hopes of finding out more about what they call an ongoing attempt at intimidating the judiciary.
Some of the pizza deliveries have gone to judges’ relatives. In recent weeks, orders have been placed in the name of U.S. District Judge Esther Salas’s son, Daniel Anderl, who was fatally shot at the family home in New Jersey in 2020 by an attorney who posed as a delivery person.
In an interview with The Washington Post, U.S. Circuit Judge J. Michelle Childs, who serves in Washington, said she has received seven anonymous pizza deliveries at her home in the past few months — one shortly after she took part in a ruling against the Trump administration in a lawsuit over the firing of an independent government watchdog.
“It’s unsettling because I’d like to go to work every day, even with the hardest case, just feeling like there’s no sense of intimidation,” said Childs, president of the Federal Judges Association.
“It’s really an unnecessary and an unfortunate threat to our security when we’re trying to be judicial officers in a very neutral position with respect to our cases,” she said. “You need a strong judiciary for the system to work. This is infringing on democracy generally.”….