Posted on 05/07/2018 3:03:58 PM PDT by Meet the New Boss
The courts were not kind last week to the Justice Department’s gamesmanship on the Russia probe, also known as the Mueller investigation, an investigation in which the cases prosecutors want to try are not about Russia, and the case about Russia prosecutors don’t want to try.
First, in the Eastern District of Virginia, where Paul Manafort is facing one of the two indictments against him, Judge T. S. Ellis hammered Mueller’s prosecutors over the issues we have been hammering for a year...
snip
And for those (myself included) who are inclined to believe Manafort is a sleazeball, it bears mention that he is unlikely to benefit from Judge Ellis’s doubts about Mueller’s authority. In the end, Mueller will probably be able to keep his case on track even if he is bruised along the way.
Even if the original appointment of Mueller is infirm, Rosenstein’s August 2 memo clearly authorized him to prosecute Manafort on the offenses involving Ukraine. The judge may not like it, but the court has no business telling the Justice Department what prosecutor to assign to a case. And even if the judge is right (he is) about why Mueller is so aggressively pursuing Manafort, there is nothing illegal or unusual about that: Prosecutors pressure suspects to help roll up other suspects all the time.
(Excerpt) Read more at nationalreview.com ...
This is why Special Counsel sleazy lawyer Dreeben claimed that sleazy Deputy AG Rosenstein secretly gave him authority orally before August 2.
Well, if that's the claim, then the defense must be granted the opportunity to examine Rosenstein and Mueller in court under oath to establish exactly what was said between the two before the search warrants and raid on the home.
And defense counsel must be given to latitude to question them and obtain discovery of relevant documents related to the appointment generally, whether it complied with law and to what extent disgraced former FBI Director Jimmy 'the Weasel' Comey procured the special counsel appointment for corrupt and illegal reasons.
Is August 2nd, 2017 before, or after the Manafort searches?
August 2 was after.
There was also a search warrant May 27, 2017 obtained by Mueller for files in a Manafort storage bin that was based on probable cause for on tax, lobbying, bank stuff - not Russian collusion.
https://www.cnn.com/2017/08/09/politics/paul-manafort-search-fbi-russian-interference/index.html
The raid on Manafort was on July 26th, 2017.
A full week before Rosenstein issued his memo.
McCarthy is right about this. I should have been a lawyer, because I said the same thing two months ago. Manafort’s legal team can challenge search warrants and try to get evidence thrown out, but trying to claim that a specific prosecutor shouldn’t have been assigned to the case is a real stretch and isn’t likely to go anywhere.
I just read the Aug 2nd memo.
It states, clearly, the Manafort case was always in assigned scope, but that the original memo was designed for public release and didn’t want to name individuals.
It then goes on to name Manafort and list the allegations that could be investigated, to include his dealings with Ukraine, and potential conspiracy with the Russians.
Then there’s an entire redacted page of OTHER things about Manafort he can investigate.
Mueller was given legal authority to go after Manafort post facto.
It’s not that simple. Mueller wasn’t just another prosecutor already in the DOJ at the time this thing cropped up.
He was a private citizen pulled off the street and given prosecutorial power. The legitimacy of his prosecutorial power rests entirely on the validity of the DOJ special counsel regs and his appointment thereunder.
https://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3653359/posts
I just cannot understand how we got to this point. If there is any legal process that could conceivably require a higher standard of fairness, integrity and competence than prosecuting a sitting President in connection with the circumstances of the election campaign, I don’t what it would be, and yet, this whole thing from start to finish has been characterized by nothing except for the lowest standards of fairness, integrity, and competence imaginable. It just boggles the mind.
“...trying to claim that a specific prosecutor shouldn’t have been assigned to the case is a real stretch...”
Müller is not just another US Attorney. He is a special case, having never been confirmed by the US Senate. Müller is a Special Counsel of the DoJ, not a freelance hit man arbitrarily assigned by the AG.
I really can’t keep up with all this - I don’t see where the judge said anything about what prosecutor is assigned to the case. He called on Mueller’s investigators to provide info by Wednesday..how is that construed to mean the following:
“”but the court has no business telling the Justice Department what prosecutor to assign to a case.””
.
I do not think it matters what was said before the warrant became legal. As well, Manafort should have insisted on seeing the warrant.
Andew McCarthy may be right about the legal aspect of the case but Manafort is trying to win the case in the court of public opinion.
Doesn’t matter if the government has a case if the public thinks the government is prosecution someone just to get to the President. Its called a witch hunt.
Mueller may be right about his authorities but they don’t matter if people see you like they saw Ken Starr. Starr was painted a dirty old man preoccupied with sex. Mueller is portrayed as a political hack obsessed with Russia.
They got/could get an impeachment route but forget about seeing their target removed from office. Its all about politics and the jury they have to persuade isn’t a federal judge; its the American people.
Good luck with it.
Not tough enough. Not by a long way.
THEY SHOULD ALL BE ARRESTED FOR CONSPIRACY TO COMMIT TREASON AND THROWN IN FEDERAL PRISON. PERIOD.
The above is all EASY TO PROVE, even with information that is public let alone undisclosed at this time. FISA warrants OBTAINED BY HILARY-AGENT COMEY based on a PHONY DOSSIER FUNDED BY HILLARY is enough evidence to arrest just about ALL OF THEM. CASE CLOSED.
Notice how QUIET the FISA judges have been? ARREST THEM TOO BECAUSE THEY WERE ALL COMPLICIT IN THIS ATTEMPTED COUP!
Robert Mueller has to be meeting with people who are telling him what to do. I know about his history, but Democrats and probably some Republicans are telling him to continue this. He is not acting alone. If Robert Mueller was not selected to be in charge of this witch hunt, then someone else would have been appointed and doing similar things. How would he get away with going after things that don’t have anything to do with the Election?
“Just because the Aug 2 memo says it was in his scope it would have had to be written before the search. “
No doubt that will be the basis of Manafort’s defense.
A DOJ attorney not being specific? Good Judges don’t like that. The are rightfully concerned about prosecutorial misconduct. It’s endemic in the US DOJ.
Who’s to say Rosenstein did’nt modify the order after it was known Manafort was dirty, only as the fruit of a poisoned tree...a tree that was not know to exist until the DOJ broke the law.
And yes, Manafort is filthy.
But he still has rights all of us would want to see protected, not unlike Nazis marching in Skokie.
p
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