SIGforum.com Main Page The Lounge The Steele dossier // p169 Durham Report: FBI Should Never Have Begun ‘Russia Collusion’ Investigation
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| wishing we were congress |
https://www.foxnews.com/politi...be-motion-to-dismiss Attorneys for Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann filed a motion Thursday to dismiss the case against him in Special Counsel John Durham's investigation, claiming a case of "extraordinary prosecutorial overreach." Sussmann asserts in the motion to dismiss that the Durham indictment "fail[s] to state an offense." He has been charged with making a false statement to a federal agent, and has pleaded not guilty. Durham's indictment alleges that Sussmann told then-FBI General Counsel James Baker in September 2016, less than two months before the 2016 presidential election, that he was not doing work "for any client" when he requested and held a meeting in which he presented "purported data and 'white papers' that allegedly demonstrated a covert communications channel" between the Trump Organization and Alfa Bank, which has ties to the Kremlin. But in the motion to dismiss Thursday, Sussmann’s legal team insisted that he "did not make any false statement to the FBI." The attorney added that the false statement alleged in the indictment is "about an entirely ancillary matter," and "immaterial as a matter of law." "It has long been a crime to make a false statement to the government. But the law criminalizes only false statements that are material—false statements that matter because they can actually affect a specific decision of the government," the lawyers wrote, adding that, by contrast, false statements "about ancillary matters" are "immaterial and cannot give rise to criminal liability." "Accordingly, where individuals have been prosecuted for providing tips to government investigators, they have historically been charged with making a false statement only where the tip itself was alleged to be false, because that is the only statement that could affect the specific decision to commence an investigation," the lawyers wrote. "Indeed, the defense is aware of no case in which an individual has provided a tip to the government and has been charged with making any false statement other than providing a false tip. But that is exactly what has happened here." "He met with the FBI, in other words, to provide a tip," Sussmann’s lawyers wrote. "There is no allegation in the indictment that the tip he provided was false. And there is no allegation that he believed the tip he provided was false. Rather, Mr. Sussmann has been charged with making a false statement about an entirely ancillary matter—about who his client may have been when he met with the FBI—which is a fact that even the Special Counsel’s own Indictment fails to allege had any effect on the FBI’s decision to open an investigation." "Allowing this case to go forward would risk criminalizing ordinary conduct, raise First Amendment concerns, dissuade honest citizens from coming forward with tips, and chill the advocacy of lawyers who interact with the government," his lawyers argued. "The Special Counsel’s unprecedented and unlawful overreach should not be countenanced, and the single count against Mr. Sussmann should be dismissed," they added. | |||
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Fire begets Fire |
Well Martha, Scooter and Flynn might say otherwise… "Pacifism is a shifty doctrine under which a man accepts the benefits of the social group without being willing to pay - and claims a halo for his dishonesty." ~Robert A. Heinlein | |||
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Member |
Recent history would surely indicate that not only is "extraordinary prosecutorial overreach" not a disqualifier, it's sanctified. Set the controls for the heart of the Sun. | |||
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| wishing we were congress |
https://pjmedia.com/news-and-p...urham-probe-n1560091 On Thursday, attorneys for Michael Sussmann, the lawyer from Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign who was charged last year with lying to federal agents, filed a motion to dismiss Special Counsel John Durham’s case against him, reports the New York Post. The lawyers called the matter “extraordinary prosecutorial overreach.” Sussmann’s legal team insists that he didn’t make false statements to the FBI and that he’s being targeted on a technicality. Sussman voluntarily approached FBI agents in Sept. 2016 to “pass along information that raised national security concerns.” Instead, Sussman came to them with bogus information linking the Trump Organization and the Kremlin-linked Alfa-Bank. “He met with the FBI, in other words, to provide a tip. There is no allegation in the indictment that the tip he provided was false. And there is no allegation that he believed that the tip he provided was false,” Sussman’s lawyer’s motion reads. “Rather, Mr. Sussmann has been charged with making a false statement about an entirely ancillary matter — about who his client may have been when he met with the FBI — which is a fact that even the special counsel’s own indictment fails to allege had any effect on the FBI’s decision to open an investigation. Allowing this case to go forward would risk criminalizing ordinary conduct, raise First Amendment concerns, dissuade honest citizens from coming forward with tips, and chill the advocacy of lawyers who interact with the government.” xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx So Sussmann is arguing that there is no difference between: a) someone coming to the FBI w a tip. someone who has no bias or interest in the matter. just trying to alert the FBI versus b) A paid political operative providing gravely negative information on the political opponent of the campaign that is funding that operative As if an honest and fair FBI wouldn't view the information in case b) much more potentially less credible than case a) These crooks got caught. Sussmann never thought this would become public knowledge. AND remember earlier posts that this was almost certainly coordinated w Christopher Steele. Steele reported that Alfa Bank was linked to Putin. Steele's report made no mention of Trump or the Trump campaign. Just a very odd isolated report that didn't seem to have any connection to Trump. In the same time period as Steele's report, Sussmann comes to the FBI and tries to link Trump to Alfa Bank communications. You really think this was a "coincidence" ? | |||
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| Husband, Father, Aggie, all around good guy!  |
I wonder if Hillary still treats her SS detail like scum. I recall hearing when they were in the White House that they made the young military servicemen who staff the White House dress in street clothes versus their uniforms. And that she treated the staff and SS like scum. She looks old and fat these days. Living the lie all these years has to be stressful. HK AG | |||
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Member |
That van reminds me of the one in Hannibal that carried that guy around who planned to feed Hannibal to the boars. | |||
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| wishing we were congress |
I don't understand the exact functions of Neustar (Rodney Joffe) had with WH computers and servers. But Stephen McIntyre and Techno Fog have observed that during the summer of 2016 Trump was the REP candidate for President, and GSA urged Trump during this period to use govt GSA equipment. "Trump transition team had contract with GSA under which GSA provided "an architected infrastructure". GSA urged Trump campaign to use "GSA provided" government-funded equipment because of " heightened cybersecurity risks "." This "architected infrastructure" appears to include Neustar /Rodney Joffe. And from Oct 2020 GSA let Mueller secretly gain access to Trump transition records, Senate report says https://www.washingtonexaminer...s-senate-report-says The FBI and special counsel Robert Mueller’s team secretly sought and received access to the private records of President-elect Trump’s transition team from the General Services Administration despite an agreement between Trump and the administrative agency, according to a new Senate report. “The United States is renowned for its peaceful transitions of power. Since at least the early 1960s, presidential candidates have received government assistance in forming and administering their transition teams. Every major presidential candidate over the past five decades — both winners and losers in the general election — has made use of government assistance to support his or her transition team under the assumption that government employees were cooperating with the team in good faith,” the GOP Senate report said. “That presumption of good faith was called into question in 2016. This majority staff report tells an important, yet overlooked, story about how” the FBI and Mueller’s team "secretly sought and received access to the private records of" Trump for America, Inc. "despite the terms of a memorandum of understanding between” Trump’s transition team and the GSA “that those records were the transition team’s private property that would not be retained at the conclusion of the transition.” During that time frame, the report noted that Obama-appointee Denise Turner Roth was the head of the GSA until Timothy Horne’s appointment as acting administrator on Jan. 20, 2017. Horne held the role until Emily Murphy was sworn in as GSA administrator on December 12, 2017. "Even after the Trump transition team learned about the FBI’s secret preservation request, the GSA nevertheless refused to provide the Trump transition team copies of its own records," the report said, adding that "the GSA turned those same records over to the Special Counsel without requiring any legal process, such as a subpoena or warrant.” The Homeland Security Committee received a Dec. 19, 2017 letter from Trump for America’s general counsel Kory Langhofer and the investigation of "the information provided by the GSA and the FBI confirmed this conduct and further revealed several other problems with the GSA’s stewardship of the Trump transition records," the report said. | |||
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| wishing we were congress |
once again there has been some discoveries from the defamation trial that the Russian Alfa bank people have filed Very recently the depositions of Rodney Joffe and Peter Fritsch (Fusion GPS) were publicly released. While Joffe and Fritsch routinely pled the 5th amendment, some of the questions referenced emails that have been found. So the info is in the questions being asked, rather than the answers. I don't understand DNS, MX, and TOR but it appears there was more than just reading data, some info was actually planted to make it look like communications were taking place. In the Sussmann filings, Durham mentions a Health Company also being monitored. "Did you understand that the Trump or Alfa servers had been reconfigured from a mail server ?" "What did you mean when you said reconfigure a mail server to make MZ look-ups look like a look-ups?" "Why do you believe the server was reconfigured in this way?" "What did you mean by, plan to tor exit node on someone's server ?" "What did you mean when you said it had been planted on someone's server ?" "Did you think this was part of a ruse to make it look like there were communications that did not actually exist?" "Did you understand that the tor exit node was on Spectrum Health's system ?" "And that someone planted it ?" "You know who the original source of the logs is, correct, Mr. Fritsch?" "Mr. Fritsch, was there any work agreement between Mr. Joffe and Fusion ?" "When you were speaking to Mr. Joffe, did you or Perkins Coie or anyone tell you that your communications would be privileged ?" "How did the meeting come about with Mr. Sussmann, Mr. Elias, members of the Fusion team, and Mr. Joffe ?" "So Edward Baungartner on 8/30/2016 sent you and Glenn Simpson an email called the Alfa Playbook" "What was the purpose of the Alfa Playbook ?" "Did Mr. Simpson instruct Mr. Steele to produce intelligence on Alfa Group, its principals, and any links to President Putin ?" Lots more linking many names and actors to the Alfa Bank phony fabrications. This was quite the operation. | |||
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| wishing we were congress |
what a joke FEC fines DNC and Clinton for Trump dossier hoax https://www.washingtonexaminer...r-trump-dossier-hoax The Federal Election Commission has fined the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign for lying about the funding of the infamous, and discredited, Russian “dossier” used in a smear attempt against Donald Trump weeks before he shocked the world with his 2016 presidential victory. The election agency said that Clinton and the DNC violated strict rules on describing expenditures of payments funneled to the opposition research firm Fusion GPS through their law firm. A combined $1,024,407.97 was paid by the treasurers of the DNC and Clinton campaign to law firm Perkins Coie for Fusion GPS’s information, and the party and campaign hid the reason, claiming it was for legal services, not opposition research. Instead, the DNC’s $849,407.97 and the Clinton campaign’s $175,000 covered Fusion GPS’s opposition research on the dossier, a basis for the so-called “Russia hoax” that dogged Trump’s first term. The memo said that the Clinton campaign and DNC argued that they were correct in describing their payment as for “legal advice and services” because it was Perkins Coie that hired Fusion GPS. But the agency said the law is clear and was violated. It added that neither the campaign nor the party conceded to lying but won’t contest the finding. “Solely for the purpose of settling this matter expeditiously and to avoid further legal costs, respondent[s] does not concede, but will not further contest the commission's finding of probable cause to proceed” with the probe, said the FEC. The FEC, in a memo to the Coolidge Reagan Foundation, which filed its complaint over three years ago, said it fined Clinton’s treasurer $8,000 and the DNC’s treasurer $105,000. chump change | |||
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| Gracie Allen is my personal savior! |
Sure. The question now is what someone else with a team of lawyers can do with what the FEC has made a legally established fact as far as the courts are concerned. Didn't Trump have a lawsuit going on that basis? | |||
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| Member |
I am pretty sure that Pres. Trump is looking for a LOT more money from the DNC and the Clintons.......plus charges!! | |||
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| wishing we were congress |
This post is about the John Durham indictment of Michael Sussmann https://technofog.substack.com...ael-sussmann-and?s=r edited slightly to make it clear while cutting and pasting There was a flurry of filings in the Michael Sussmann case late yesterday. Here’s the latest. On September 19, 2016, DNC/Clinton Campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann met with FBI General Counsel James Baker, where Baker was provided with data and “white paper” purporting to show covert communications (since proven to be bogus) between Russian Alfa Bank and the Trump Organization. Special Counsel John Durham has just provided evidence that the night before – on September 18, 2016 – Sussmann sent Baker this text:  As it turns out, Sussmann was billing the Clinton Campaign for his work on the Alfa Bank hoax. This text from Sussmann to Baker is damning for Sussmann’s case, proving Sussmann’s efforts at deceiving a top official at the FBI about his clients, and demonstrating how Sussmann tried to convince Baker he was there to supposedly do the right thing. Sussmann also asks the Court to order the Special Counsel to give Rodney Joffe immunity for his testimony – or have the case dismissed. Of course, Joffe (Tech Executive-1 in the Sussmann indictment) is the Sussmann client who helped lead the effort to manufacture the Alfa Bank/Trump hoax. Sussmann maintains that Joffe would “offer critical exculpatory testimony on behalf of Mr. Sussmann” – but cannot because Durham is “manufacturing incredible claims of continuing criminal liability for Mr. Joffe that are forcing Mr. Joffe to assert his Fifth Amendment right.” Joffe’s attorney wrote that the statute of limitations had run since the events described in the Sussmann indictment. The Special Counsel disagreed, stating that “certain fraud statutes have longer than a five-year limitations period,” and the Russian Yota phone-related allegations (given to the CIA in February 2017) “percolated through various branches of the government and around the private sector after that date, in various forms.” A Sussmann filing also mentions Durham’s “discriminatory approach to immunity in this case.” The motion continues, stating that one witness has immunity – and that the Special Counsel is considering granting immunity for a second witness . Durham states the “evidence of a joint venture or conspiracy” will establish that Sussmann and Joffe “worked in concert with each other and with agents of the Clinton Campaign to research and disseminate the Russian Bank-1 allegations.” That statement from Durham leaves us with an important question: which “agents of the Clinton Campaign” were involved in this conspiracy? also from today's filing:  Tech Exec 1 = Joffe Campaign Lawyer 1 = Marc EliasThis message has been edited. Last edited by: sdy, | |||
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Member |
This needs to get out there, to preempt any Biden administration attempts to quash the investigation/prosecution of ALL those involved in the "CONSPIRACY." They need to be prosecuted to the furthest extent of the law...including HRC!!! https://justthenews.com/accoun...-relentless-democrat "I'm not fluent in the language of violence, but I know enough to get around in places where it's spoken." | |||
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| wishing we were congress |
in getting ready for the Michael Sussmann trial, John Durham is filing lots of court documents hard to keep up. latest one is discussed by Margot Cleveland at: https://twitter.com/ProfMJClev.../1511873014828310532 Will capture some of her highlights: Durham files Motion to Compel Clinton Campaign, DNC, and Fusion GPS to produce material withheld based on "attorney-client" privilege. First main argument is that Fusion wasn't retained to help w/ legal advise but to get dirt & that isn't protected. Fusion GPS trying to hurry reporters to publish stories before authenticity was resolved creates significant libel and defamation risk Fusion GPS book by Glenn Simpson and Peter Fritsch suggests that Marc Elias structured the relationship between Fusion and Perkins Coie law firm to maintain confidentiality over their work Elias wanted it that way so their communications were considered privileged and kept confidential this has been one of the Clinton's standard tricks. involve lawyers in the dirty deeds and then claim attorney/client privilege Rodney Joffe retained Michael Sussmann as his lawyer (same trick ?) Sussmann billed the Clinton Campaign when he worked on the Alfa Bank paper given to the FBI Joffe can't claim attorney / client privilege w Sussmann xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx It would appear Durham has quite a case lined up. Let's hope something finally breaks | |||
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| Member |
I'm no lawyer, but AFAIK, atty-client privilege cannot apply when its to cover up a crime and was intended all along to cover up a crime. | |||
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| wishing we were congress |
There is an aspect to the filings that is speculative Some observers feel Durham only recently discovered the text message from Sussmann to James Baker And there have been indications that Durham found out that DoJ IG Michael Horowitz was holding two of James Bakers phones from when Baker was FBI General counsel. Durham asked for the phones and DoJ IG gave them to him. And perhaps that is how the texts were discovered. remember Horowitz wrote a rather damning report including some of the Strzok/Lisa Page texts, but then concluded there was "no bias" in the FBI efforts to investigate Donald Trump. Seemed like a very strange "conclusion". Even more so now. xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx diff issue: re attorney /client privilege Opposition research is not "legal advice". Communications about opposition research is not privileged.This message has been edited. Last edited by: sdy, | |||
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| wishing we were congress |
I don't know the exact date, but I think the Sussmann trial is supposed to start around | |||
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| wishing we were congress |
well we have been here so many times and come up disappointed. Hoping that doesn't happen w Durham Article by Techno Fog https://technofog.substack.com...ussmann-data-was?s=r This attack on Donald Trump gets worse and worse w everything we have learned Readers Digest version: Sussmann visited CIA 31 Jan 2017 (Trump is already president). Sussmann tells CIA that PRESIDENT Trump has been secretly using a unique Russian made phone. Sussmann says this activity started in April 2016 and continued after Trump moved to the White House. Sussmann met again w the CIA on 9 Feb 2017. He repeated his allegations about the "Russian made Yota-phone". Sussmann further alleged that the Yota phone was seen connecting to WIFI from the Executive Office of the President. The CIA accepted the Yota phone data and the Alfa Bank data. The CIA concluded the data was not "technically plausible" and was "user created and not machine/tool generated" Durham's office has not reached a definitive conclusion in this regard. ????? "Researcher-2" has been given immunity. This is believed to David Dagon of Georgia Tech Sussmann argues that Joffe can't be prosecuted because of the 5 year Statute of Limitations (SOL). can you believe that ? the FBI and Mueller screwed this up to hide all this, and now these clowns hide behind SOL Durham is also pursuing immunity for someone at Fusion GPS. Techno fog is guessing it might be Laura Seago. At the end, Techno Fog speculates there may be even more dirty tricks to uncover. Sussmann was the one who called in Crowdstrike to examine the DNC servers in April 2016. Crowdstrike immediately declared the Russians hacked DNC. but the FBI was never allowed to examine the servers. It relied on Crowdstrike. xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx So did the CIA tell the sitting President that accusations were being made about him that were utterly baseless? Durham: CIA "concluded in early 2017 that the Russian Bank-1 data and Russian Phone Provider-1 data was not “technically plausible,” did not “withstand technical scrutiny,” “contained gaps,” “conflicted with [itself]” Hans Mahncke: They never said a word, allowing the country to be destroyed. | |||
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| No More Mr. Nice Guy |
I would argue that SOL should apply to those people, unfortunately. Dishonest or incompetent actions by officials should not stop the clock for SOL. Anyone engaged in dishonest activities in the their official capacity should be prosecuted to the harshest extent of the law. If the original criminals were in any way involved in the cover up, then that opens new avenues. This rises to some form of treason imho, so it should be no small slap on the wrist for those in DOJ etc who let the original crimes slide by without serious prosecution. | |||
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Baroque Bloke |
This article is a few days old, but I like what I’m reading of judge Cooper. “The federal judge presiding over the case of former Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann [U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper] denied his request to dismiss the case brought against him by Special Counsel John Durham Wednesday, ordering that the trial go forward as planned next month…” MUCH more that I like in the linked foxnews article: https://www.foxnews.com/politi...begin-next-month.amp Serious about crackers | |||
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SIGforum.com Main Page The Lounge The Steele dossier // p169 Durham Report: FBI Should Never Have Begun ‘Russia Collusion’ Investigation
Main Page The Lounge The Steele dossier // p169 Durham Report: FBI Should Never Have Begun ‘Russia Collusion’ Investigation© SIGforum 2024