The 2020 witness intimidation incident represents one of the most egregious constitutional violations in Mr. Nuno's decade-long harassment campaign. Police threats against his romantic partner—a widowed single mother—created an impossible "catch-22" situation that fundamentally violated due process protections and coerced guilty pleas across multiple King County jurisdictions. This analysis examines how law enforcement's threat that she would "lose custody of her child and never see her son again" unless she testified against Mr. Nuno created an unconstitutional coercion scheme that rendered his subsequent pleas involuntary and violated core constitutional protections.
The police threats against Mr. Nuno's romantic partner constitute clear violations of substantive due process under the Fourteenth Amendment. Under established precedent in Brady v. Maryland and Walker v. Johnston, external pressures that fundamentally undermine plea voluntariness violate constitutional protections[1].
Research confirms that "coercive plea bargaining has poisoned the criminal justice system"[2] and creates "damned if you do, damned if you don't" scenarios that violate constitutional protections. The Supreme Court has held that "agents of the State may not produce a plea by actual or threatened physical harm or by mental coercion overbearing the will of the defendant"[3].
The 2020 threats meet all elements of unconstitutional coercion:
The witness intimidation created a paradigmatic "catch-22" situation where Mr. Nuno faced impossible choices:
| Option | Action | Consequence | Constitutional Violation |
|---|---|---|---|
| A | Acknowledge coercion in court | Immediate retaliation against witness | Due process violation through retaliation |
| B | Remain silent about threats | Allow tainted plea process to proceed | Due process violation through coerced plea |
This situation violates the Supreme Court's holding in United States v. Jackson that the state cannot "impose an impermissible burden upon the exercise of a constitutional right"[4]. The coercive structure prevented Mr. Nuno from exercising his constitutional rights without triggering immediate harm to an innocent third party.
The coerced pleas violated Mr. Nuno's Fifth Amendment protection against compelled self-incrimination. Under Boykin v. Alabama, guilty pleas must be "voluntary and intelligent"[5]. The witness intimidation rendered the pleas involuntary by creating external coercion that "overbore the will of the defendant"[3].