The SPLC DOJ case will move forward after a federal judge rejected the Montgomery-based nonprofit’s attempt to dismiss an 11-count federal indictment as a “vindictive prosecution.” U.S. District Judge Emily C. Marks on Friday denied the Southern Poverty Law Center’s motion to dismiss the charges and a related request to conduct discovery into the Justice Department’s motives for bringing the case. The SPLC had argued that the prosecution was politically motivated retaliation by the Trump administration for the organization’s speech and advocacy. Marks found the organization had not presented sufficient evidence connecting alleged hostility from administration officials to the federal prosecutors who made the decision to bring the charges. “The SPLC has failed to offer some evidence tending to show animus on the part of the prosecutors involved in bringing this case and that such animus resulted in the prosecution,” Marks wrote.