FRED Olivares: The Gatekeeper Who Switched Sides — and the Prosecutor Who Let Him
When you peel back the layers of my case, you don’t just find lies — you find proximity. Proximity to the facts. Proximity to the agents. Proximity to the truth that never made it into the courtroom.
Take Fred Olivares.
The government called him a defense investigator. What they didn’t tell the court, or the public is that Olivares wasn’t just any investigator. He was a former FBI Special Agent who sat shoulder-to-shoulder with the government’s original case agent, Erin Isley, at the San Antonio field office during the early years of the investigation against me.
In fact, she took her problems to him. Not just because he was experienced — but because he was her daily advisor. He sat at the desk right next to hers. The Department of Justice admitted as much in a 2018 letter from Gregory Surovics to my former attorney.
Yet somehow, Fred Olivares later walked onto my defense team. No one blinked. No one disclosed. No one stopped it.
And the prosecutor? He let it happen.
When you dig into Fred’s resume, it becomes clear he wasn’t some passive, retired agent with no ties. He publicly advertises that he reviewed federal criminal cases for both factual and legal sufficiency. He reviewed cases like mine.
Think about that.
If Fred Olivares had been sitting on the prosecution team with that level of proximity, the defense would have moved to disqualify him immediately.
But when he switched sides?
They just let it slide.
Conflict doesn’t get much clearer than that. It’s not speculation. It’s documented. And the harm didn’t end with my conviction — it continues with every day I remain confined while they pretend none of this matters.
This is what it looks like when a justice system protects its own instead of the truth.
Fred Olivares played both sides of the chessboard. And the prosecutor who let him do it — Gregory Surovics — still hasn’t explained why.
While Fred Olivares quietly joined my defense team despite a clear conflict, what’s worse is that Thomas McHugh — my lead attorney — said nothing. He never objected, never disclosed, and never challenged the government on Olivares’ proximity to the original case agent. Read how McHugh failed at the most basic level of legal defense: The Indictment Failure of Thomas McHugh.