Anti-Trump dossier source says 'anti-Russian bias' could prevent a fair trial (Durham)

washingtonexaminer.com ^ | 8/1/2022 | jerry dunleavy

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The alleged main Russian source for British ex-spy Christopher Steele’s dossier has claimed anti-Russian bias could stop him from getting a fair trial.

Igor Danchenko’s lawyer, Danny Onorato, raised the issue during a pretrial hearing on Monday. The lawyer backed up the claim, noting there are a number of Ukrainian flags around Alexandria, Virginia, amid Russia's invasion, which started in February.

The attorney suggested the defense team may try to find a way to address that issue in the questionnaire for jurors during the selection process in the trial, brought by special counsel John Durham.

Danchenko was charged last year with five counts of making false statements to the FBI. Durham has claimed the comments were about the information he provided to Steele for the dossier. The Department of Justice's watchdog said FBI interviews with Danchenko “raised significant questions about the reliability of the Steele election reporting” and concluded Danchenko undermined Steele’s unfounded claims of a “well-developed conspiracy” between former President Donald Trump and Russia.

The Russia-born lawyer has lived and worked in the Washington, D.C., area for many years and allegedly relied on a network of Russian contacts but undermined key collusion claims when interviewed by the FBI. According to Durham’s false statements charges, he anonymously sourced a fabricated claim about Trump Campaign Manager Paul Manafort to longtime Hillary Clinton ally Chuck Dolan, who spent many years, including 2016, doing work for Russian businesses and the Russian government.

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I’ll read about it in the Washington Post to get more in-depth detail. Either that or the some high-school journalism club weekly e-news podcast.