In United States v. Morales, (SD CA, Dec. 13, 2021), a California federal district court denied a motion to dismiss indictments against three defendants who claimed that the indictments violated their rights under RFRA and the Free Exercise Clause. Among the charges were that defendants induced Imperial Valley Ministry participants to surrender SNAP benefits to the Ministries and that they dispatched IVM participants to panhandle. The court said in part:
The Court finds too attenuated a link between the Government’s prosecution of Defendants for forced labor, document servitude, and benefits fraud and Defendants’ purported religious activities of evangelizing, fundraising, donating to the church, and general operation of IVM programs for there to be a substantial burden, as there remain viable alternative avenues for Defendants to conduct their specified religious activities....
