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triplehorn

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Posts posted by triplehorn

  1. Spoiler

     

    Reportedly, Trump US Atty appointment to SDNY, Jeff Berman, recused himself from the ongoing Cohen investigation per input from DoJ officials in DC.  The specifics of the conflict of interest weren't reported, but Berman was a Trump donor, served on the Trump transition team, personally interviewed with Trump for the SDNY gig, and is a former law partner of Rudy.

    Turns out Berman is an interim appointment whose term is set to end next week in the midst of the mushrooming ordeal involving Trump's consigliere.  Based on what we know about how Trump operates and his feelings about Sessions recusal from the Trump/Russia investigation, there is concern that it presents an opportunity for Trump to appoint a new SDNY US Atty who wouldn't have to recuse and could potentially lean on things.

    That possibility got squelched today.  Federal judges for the District Court of SDNY made Berman's appointment permanent.  Judges can do that evidently.  That's a key firewall against meddling in the Cohen investigation that will remain intact. 

     

    re-posted on the relevant thread.

  2. Holy Karmic retribution !

    EXCLUSIVE: Comey Has Brought On Former U.S. Attorney Pat Fitzgerald As One Of His Lawyers

    Quote

    Fired FBI Director James Comey has retained former U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald as one of his personal attorneys, bringing in a heavy-hitting former prosecutor, close friend and longtime colleague to help him navigate his dramatic role as a potential witness in the investigation of President Trump’s campaign and potential obstruction of justice.

    Two Capitol Hill sources independently told TPM that Fitzgerald was serving as a lawyer for Comey. After publication, Fitzgerald confirmed that he “has been part of Mr. Comey’s legal team since May 2017.”

    The news adds an additional twist to President Trump’s recent decision to pardon Scooter Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney’s former chief of staff, for his role in the Valerie Plame affair.

    Comey, then the deputy attorney general, was the man who authorized the special counsel’s investigation into “the alleged unauthorized disclosure of a CIA employee’s identity” in late 2003, the case that eventually led to Libby’s conviction for perjury and obstruction of justice. His choice for special counsel, the prosecutor who got the guilty verdict on Libby, was none other than Fitzgerald.

    cont.

    Spoiler

    100108-2277df78f1f04b2a92ff2b6fccff0687-

     

  3. Ha, I'd say her response was...informative.  

    She'd agree to talk in Berlin, not in DC, and appeared last summer to be requesting a guarantee of "safety" i.e. immunity for her participation.  Dossier "absolute nonsense," assuming she's qualified to render that assessment.  She's a snake in the grass.

     

  4. 5 minutes ago, sheeeit said:

    Well she did testify to the HIC for 3 hours in Berlin. 

    you mean this interview, which I hadn't seen: Senate panel talks to Russian lawyer who met with Trump Jr.

    Quote

    The person familiar with the conversation, who spoke to Veselnitskaya, said the dossier was discussed more than her involvement in the Trump Tower meeting.

    A spokeswoman for Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr, R-N.C., didn’t return a request for comment. A spokeswoman for Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the panel, declined to comment.

    Trump Jr., along with the president’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, and then-campaign chairman Paul Manafort met with Veselnitskaya in June 2016 after Trump Jr. was told in emails that she could provide potentially incriminating information about Clinton. The Senate investigators have expressed interest in determining whether the meeting was part of a Russian government effort to help Donald Trump’s White House campaign, which was how it was described in emails to Trump Jr. in the days before it occurred.

    Interesting, if true, that the dossier was a greater emphasis than the Trump Tower meeting in talking with her.  There is some potential she was asked to respond to things the Senators hold not rehearsed from her cheat sheet.  Nevertheless, the Trump Tower Don Jr/Kushner meeting with Russians remains a central pillar to the investigation.  

  5. 20 minutes ago, Hugo Stiglitz said:

    Rick Santorum is a douche too.

    I understand they need Trump people to give the appearance of balance but the nitwits they’ve chosen fucking suck ass.

     

    rick-santorum.jpg

     

     

  6. 20 minutes ago, Tuco said:

    1. We don't know who has been approached. 

    2. I don't know if she has been in the US any time in the last year. 

    Recall the Russian lawyer from last summer:

    Quote

    In an on-camera interview with Russian state-funded network RT Tuesday, Natalia Veselnitskaya said she is "ready to clarify the situation" as long as her safety is assured.

    "I'm ready if I'm guaranteed safety because today I have to think about my safety first and foremost, about the safety of my family, my four children," she told RT. “If the Senate wishes to hear the real story, I will be happy to speak up and share everything I wanted to tell Mr. Trump last year."

    hoo boy.

  7. 3 minutes ago, Anastasis said:

    If that meeting is the heart of the collusion case, you talk to the lawyer IMO.  I don't think that you make anything dependent on her word, but you do an interview, IMO. /notafederalprosecutor

    My understanding is that targets of investigations often are not interviewed by investigators, particularly not in front of a grand jury.  There are exceptions, but absence of interviews does not equate to absence of suspected guilt.  Obviously they do get the opportunity to answer questions in the courtroom following an indictment.

  8. Mueller adds another prosecutor: Andrew D. Goldstein

    NYT: Manhattan Prosecutor Joins Inquiry Into Russian Meddling in Election

    Spoiler

    One federal prosecutor in Manhattan is being promoted to become the new chief of the public corruption unit, while another is departing to join Robert S. Mueller III, the special counsel overseeing the investigation into Russia’s meddling in the 2016 presidential election.

    The new chief of the corruption unit in Manhattan is Tatiana R. Martins, who in 2015 helped to convict Dean G. Skelos, the Long Island Republican who was the majority leader of the State Senate until shortly after his arrest that year.

    Ms. Martins, the deputy chief of the unit, succeeds Andrew D. Goldstein, who will join Mr. Mueller’s team after having led the public corruption unit for about a year.

    As a line prosecutor, Mr. Goldstein was a member of the team that in 2015 won the conviction of Sheldon Silver, a Manhattan Democrat who had been the longtime speaker of the State Assembly.

    Mr. Goldstein is the first prosecutor to join Mr. Mueller’s team from the United States attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York, an office known for its pursuit of public corruption, white-collar crime and Wall Street fraud, the office confirmed on Friday.

    This guy checks all the boxes for what the SCO is drilling into: justice.gov

    Quote

    Howard S. Master and Andrew D. Goldstein are recognized for their investigation and prosecution of the CityTime case, the largest municipal fraud and kickback scheme in history.  Through a dogged investigation that involved tracing payments through more than 150 foreign and domestic accounts, poring through hundreds of thousands of emails and project documents, interviewing more than 100 witnesses, and securing cooperation from two key insiders, Mr. Master and Mr. Goldstein were able to prove that the City of New York’s project manager and an executive of one of the nation’s largest government contractors defrauded the City, collected tens of millions of dollars in kickbacks, and laundered their proceeds through an intricate web of corrupt subcontractors and shell accounts. The prosecution resulted in eight convictions, a deferred prosecution agreement with the contractor, and record forfeitures of over $550 million.

     

  9. 5 minutes ago, Hugo Stiglitz said:

    I’d say State sponsorship is a very clear line that separates RT/Sputnik from NYT with regard to FARA violations.

    Jury is still out on Fox, their London offices were just raided. 

    While not a media site or technically state sponsored, Mike Flynn was in violation of FARA laws while he was acting National Security Advisor.  It's a big deal punishable by up to 5yr in prison and 10k fine . 

    What kind of protections are relinquished when an individual or media outlet is forced to register under FARA ?  Can those violations be retroactive based on determination ? 

    Here's the DOJ's FAQ page on FARA:  DoJ FARA FAQ

  10. Can you envision a scenario where Fox or the NYT is forced to register in the US under FARA laws ?  Similar to what RT and Sputnik News were recently forced to do?

    What conditions have to apply to be relegated to status of being an agent of foreign power ?

  11. 1 hour ago, TwiceHorn said:

    As a general proposition, conspiracy requires participation in an offense prior to its taking place.  Only criminal law recognizes aiding and abetting or accessory after the fact.  Which I think is where some of DNC's "conspiracy" type counts fail.

     

    To be clear, the hacking was a criminal act that gives rise to civil liability for the hackers and those who conspired with the hackers to hack, before they hacked.  Civil liability for publication after the hack is getting to be a stretch, regardless of knowledge, motive, or intent.

     

    The one charge that has already made an appearance in Mueller indictments is 18 U.S. Code § 371 - Conspiracy to commit offense or to defraud United States.  Mueller’s indictment of 13 Russian people and three Russian companies accuses them of conspiring to interfere with “US political and electoral processes, including the presidential election of 2016.” 

    From a lay article:

    Quote

    What does the law say?

    Firstly, you cannot be charged with conspiracy alone. The law is used against "two or more people" - in this case, Mr Manafort and Mr Gates.

    Secondly, the law is broad. It can be used against a group who "commit any offense against the United States, or to defraud the United States, or any agency thereof in any manner or for any purpose".

    In a 1924 case, Hammerschmidt v. United States, Chief Justice William Taft (who was US President from from 1909 to 1913) defined "defraud".

    "To conspire to defraud the United States means primarily to cheat the Government out of property or money," he said.

    "But it also means to interfere with or obstruct one of its lawful governmental functions by deceit, craft or trickery, or at least by means that are dishonest."

    Realize that Wikileaks dropped the stolen Podesta emails less than an hour after the Trump Access Hollywood pussy grabber tapes were made public.  If it can be shown that Wikileaks was coordinating in real time with other entities also affiliated with the Russian hackers around the timing of the release of the emails to interfere with the electoral processes of the presidential election of 2016, it doesn't seem much of a stretch for Assange to be enveloped in the Russian conspiracy.  It will hinge on evidence from the FBI counterintelligence investigation in the form of intercepts etc., but I'd wager they've got it in spades.

  12. 17 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

    Now, if wikileaks commissioned the hacking or otherwise assisted in it, then they can burn, but the complaint doesn't say that or even sniff it and it has 233 paragraphs.

    Our IC leadership testified to the Senate that Wikileaks is a Russian intelligence cutout.  The independent hackers, the cutout front Wikileaks, and Russian intelligence are one coordinated operation.  MSM hasn't sniffed this, but Wikileaks servers evidently are now hosted in Russia.  Wikileaks reportedly obtained Russian hosting on September 30th 2016, one week before the Podesta emails were made public.  Wikileaks amounts to a pale smelly dude indefinitely holed up in the UK Ecuadorian Embassy to avoid arrest and extradition.

  13.  

    21 minutes ago, sheeeit said:

    Interesting.  Could be bullshit from Trumps own people.  Anonymous sources suck going both ways.

    But, if true, I wonder what this does to the supposed obstruction charges.  I get the "subject" versus "target" semantics, although I believe that is a bit of wishful thinking, but it could be accurate that Rosenstein is being coy with Trump and his lawyers.  But for obstruction, there can only be one target.  Only trump could fire Comey right?  In any investigation there has to be a target or supposed crime.  I have never heard of anyone else in this deal being investigated for obstruction.  Only trump.  We shall see.

    It's the same reassurance Trump has been getting since January 2017, initially from Comey and now others in the DoJ.  Recall Comey's opening statement in Senate testimony last Spring.  Transcript:

     

    Quote

    I first met then-President-Elect Trump on Friday, January 6 in a conference room at Trump Tower in New York. I was there with other Intelligence Community (IC) leaders to brief him and his new national security team on the findings of an IC assessment concerning Russian efforts to interfere in the election. At the conclusion of that briefing, I remained alone with the President-Elect to brief him on some personally sensitive aspects of the information assembled during the assessment.

    The IC leadership thought it important, for a variety of reasons, to alert the incoming President to the existence of this material, even though it was salacious and unverified. Among those reasons were: (1) we knew the media was about to publicly report the material and we believed the IC should not keep knowledge of the material and its imminent release from the President-Elect; and (2) to the extent there was some effort to compromise an incoming President, we could blunt any such effort with a defensive briefing.

    The Director of National Intelligence asked that I personally do this portion of the briefing because I was staying in my position and because the material implicated the FBI’s counter-intelligence responsibilities. We also agreed I would do it alone to minimize potential embarrassment to the President-Elect. Although we agreed it made sense for me to do the briefing, the FBI’s leadership and I were concerned that the briefing might create a situation where a new President came into office uncertain about whether the FBI was conducting a counter-intelligence investigation of his personal conduct.

    It is important to understand that FBI counter-intelligence investigations are different than the more-commonly known criminal investigative work. The Bureau’s goal in a counter-intelligence investigation is to understand the technical and human methods that hostile foreign powers are using to influence the United States or to steal our secrets. The FBI uses that understanding to disrupt those efforts. Sometimes disruption takes the form of alerting a person who is targeted for recruitment or influence by the foreign power. Sometimes it involves hardening a computer system that is being attacked. Sometimes it involves “turning” the recruited person into a double-agent, or publicly calling out the behavior with sanctions or expulsions of embassy-based intelligence officers. On occasion, criminal prosecution is used to disrupt intelligence activities.

    Because the nature of the hostile foreign nation is well known, counterintelligence investigations tend to be centered on individuals the FBI suspects to be witting or unwitting agents of that foreign power. When the FBI develops reason to believe an American has been targeted for recruitment by a foreign power or is covertly acting as an agent of the foreign power, the FBI will “open an investigation” on that American and use legal authorities to try to learn more about the nature of any relationship with the foreign power so it can be disrupted.

    In that context, prior to the Jan. 6 meeting, I discussed with the FBI’s leadership team whether I should be prepared to assure President-elect Trump that we were not investigating him personally. That was true; we did not have an open counter-intelligence case on him. We agreed I should do so if circumstances warranted. During our one-on-one meeting at Trump Tower, based on President-elect Trump’s reaction to the briefing and without him directly asking the question, I offered that assurance.

     
    Regarding obstruction of justice, you can have a conspiracy to obstruct involving multiple others.  POTUS is not clear of that though he is not a named target at this time.
     
    The distinction between subject and target is real and in this case appears to be serving an important purpose for DoJ/FBI to assuage a grossly meddling Trump so they can proceed with their investigation.  You can sense the shared awkwardness of IC leadership revealed by Comey as they attempted to figure out the best way to handle an incoming president-elect in over his ears in treason-y conduct.
     
     
  14. 58 minutes ago, SuingToGetAMessageBoard? said:

    I thinking is a big deal.  It moves that allegation from what we think to what the guys actually looking at evidence and can do something about it thinks. 

    Basically, in laying out how Manafort's crimes fall under the mandate of the SCO, they show that they have a bead on a mature well established network - the communications patterns and the hidden illicit money flow employed systematically spanning years.  Once you have the network operations defined, it's a smaller step to see all the avenues where the network was applied, i.e. Trump campaign with Manafort as Trump's campaign chair including continued direct operation with Manafort after he stepped down under a cloud.

    Realize also GOP bagman and Manafort partner in said Ukraine/RUS network, Rick Gates,  has struck a guilty plea deal in exchange for full cooperation with SCO.

  15.  
    Natasha Bertrand reports: 
    Quote

     

    In response to Schneiderman's letter, Cuomo spox emails: "Governor Cuomo believes that the federal legal system should not provide a basis for any wrong doers to escape justice...we are reviewing the proposal and look forward to working with the Attorney General on the issue."

     

     

     

    If there's one state that can drop the hammer on this entire WH family syndicate, it's New York.

     

  16. This is peculiar:

    Prosecutors Say Cohen Under Investigation, Rebut Privilege Claims

    Quote

    Documents disclosed in the Southern District of New York show that Michael Cohen, the personal lawyer for President Donald Trump, is the subject of a criminal inquiry into his personal business dealings. He also received a $500,000 "alliance fee" from Squire Patton Boggs.

    Manhattan federal prosecutors, who say they are investigating Donald Trump’s personal attorney Michael Cohen for conduct that largely centers on his “personal business dealings,” rebutted on Friday allegations that the documents seized in raids on his home and office at Squire Patton Boggs included thousands of privileged materials.

    We know today that Cohen brought in no clients for SPB.  So who paid that $500k and for what ?  SPB? An SPB client?  SPB reportedly has offices in Moscow and Kiev and is one of the firms representing Cambridge Analytica and Gazprom.  Perhaps there's a normal explanation, I'm just failing to see it in the wake of the abrupt dissolution of Cohen's office from the SPB office space in NY.

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