Former FBI Director, James Comey. Photo by Mark Warner, Wiki Commons
Former FBI Director, James Comey. Photo by Mark Warner, Wiki Commons
Stay tuned. Donald Trump has been trying to get Comey charged with a crime for nine years. This may be the week when we learn whether or not the charges he has ginned-up will stick.
Republished with permission from Lucian K. Truscott IV
A federal judge in Virginia, Cameron McGowan Currie, dismissed the indictment of James Comey today in a ruling which involved whether interim U.S. Attorney Lindsay Halligan had been properly and legally appointed. The judge ruled that the installation of Halligan was “invalid,” thus making the indictment she brought invalid. The judge, however, dismissed the indictment “without prejudice,” meaning that the government can move to re-indict Comey on the same, or even different charges. Even though the statute of limitations has run out on the crimes Comey is alleged to have committed—lying to and obstructing Congress—there is a federal law that would allow the government to re-file dismissed indictments if Judge Currie’s ruling is permitted to stand.
The judge also dismissed the indictment of New York Attorney General Leticia James for the same reason, that Halligan was improperly appointed, thus negating the indictment against James.
Halligan was appointed to replace Erik S. Seibert, who was forced to resign as U.S. Attorney after he found there was insufficient evidence to indict either Comey or James.
Yet another ruling is expected in the Comey case, perhaps this week, by Judge Michael S. Nachmanoff, who last week held a hearing in the Eastern District of Virginia on a separate issue—whether the indictment of Comey had been properly filed by Halligan. Comey’s lawyers had challenged the indictment on the basis that the grand jury had been “tainted by government misconduct” in the way Halligan presented the case against Comey to the grand jury.
Judge Nachmanoff demanded that the government’s attorney provide the court with a copy of the “declination memo” written by Seibert at the time he had declined to indict Comey. There was a major dispute in the courtroom when the assistant U.S. attorney handling the case for Halligan, who had been brought up from North Carolina because assistant U.S. attorneys in Halligan’s office had resigned rather than be involved in the Comey indictment, tried to convince the judge that he didn’t know if a declination memo existed.
The fight over the Comey indictment went back and forth until one of the assistant U.S. attorneys revealed that the whole grand jury had not seen or signed off on the indictment after Halligan had modified it to reflect that one of the charges against Comey had been “no billed” by the grand jury. Comey’s lawyers took the position that the “new” indictment was invalid because it had been improperly presented to the grand jury.
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Lucian K. Truscott IV, a graduate of West Point, has had a 50-year career as a journalist, novelist and screenwriter. He has covered stories such as Watergate, the Stonewall riots and wars in Lebanon, Iraq and Afghanistan. He is also the author of five bestselling novels and several unsuccessful motion pictures. He has three children, lives in rural Pennsylvania and spends his time Worrying About the State of Our Nation and madly scribbling in a so-far fruitless attempt to Make Things Better.
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