Posted on 03/31/2016 9:51:16 AM PDT by Kaslin
The FBI investigation of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's failure to protect state secrets contained in her emails has entered its penultimate phase, and it is a dangerous one for her and her aides.
Federal law enforcement sources have let it be known that federal prosecutors and the FBI have completed their examination of raw data in the case. After the FBI acquires raw data -- for example, the nature and number of the state secrets in the emails Clinton failed to protect or the regular, consistent, systematic nature of that failure -- prosecutors and agents proceed to draw rational inferences from that data.
Then they proceed to corroborate those inferences, looking for other sources to support or even to contradict them. With one exception, all of this work has been done with neutral sources of evidence -- documents, email metadata, government records and technical experts.
The exception is Bryan Pagliano, the one member of Clinton's inner circle who, with either a written promise of non-prosecution or an order of immunity from a federal judge, began to cooperate with federal prosecutors last fall.
Here is what he told the feds.
Pagliano has explained to federal prosecutors the who, what, when, how and why he migrated an open State Department email stream and a secret State Department email stream from government computers to Clinton's secret server in her home in Chappaqua, New York. He has told them that Clinton paid him $5,000 to commit that likely criminal activity.
He has also told some of the 147 FBI agents assigned to this case that Clinton herself was repeatedly told by her own State Department information technology experts and their colleagues at the National Security Agency that her persistent use of her off-the-shelf BlackBerry was neither an effective nor an acceptable means of receiving, transmitting or safeguarding state secrets. Little did they know how reckless she was with government secrets, as none was apparently then aware of her use of her non-secure secret server in Chappaqua for all of her email uses.
We know that the acquisition and corroboration phase of the investigation has been completed because the prosecutors have begun to ask Clinton's top aides during her time as secretary of state to come in for interviews. This is a delicate and dangerous phase for the aides, all of whom have engaged counsel to represent them.
Here are the dangers.
The Department of Justice will not reveal to the aides or their lawyers what it knows about the case or what evidence of criminal wrongdoing, if any, it has acquired on each of them. Hence, if they submit to an FBI interview, they will go in "blind." By going in blind, the aides run the risk of getting caught in a "perjury trap." Though not under oath, they could be trapped into lying by astute prosecutors and aggressive FBI agents, as it is a crime -- the equivalent of perjury -- to lie to them or materially mislead them.
For this reason, most white-collar criminal defense lawyers will not permit their clients to be interviewed by any prosecutors or FBI agents. Martha Stewart's lawyers failed to give her that advice, and she went to prison for one lie told in one conversation with one FBI agent.
After interviewing any Clinton aides who choose to be interviewed, the DOJ personnel on the case will move their investigation into its final phase, in which they will ask Clinton herself whether she wishes to speak with them. The prosecutors will basically tell her lawyers that they have evidence of the criminal behavior of their client and that before they present it to a grand jury, they want to afford Clinton an opportunity blindly to challenge it.
This will be a moment she must devoutly wish would pass from her, as she will face a damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don't dilemma.
Here is her dilemma.
If she were to talk to federal prosecutors and FBI agents, they would catch her in many inconsistencies, as she has spoken with great deception in public about this case. She has, for example, stated many times that she used the private server so she could have one mobile device for all of her emails. The FBI knows she had four mobile devices. She has also falsely claimed publicly and under oath that she neither sent nor received anything "marked classified." The FBI knows that nothing is marked classified, and its agents also know that her unprotected secret server transmitted some of the nation's gravest secrets.
The prosecutors and agents cannot be happy about her public lies and her repeated demeaning attitude about their investigation, and they would have an understandable animus toward her if she were to meet with them.
If she were to decline to be interviewed -- a prudent legal but treacherous political decision -- the feds would leak her rejection of their invitation, and political turmoil would break loose because one of her most imprudent and often repeated public statements in this case has been that she can't wait to talk to the FBI. That's a lie, and the FBI knows it.
Some Democrats who now understand the gravity of the case against Clinton have taken to arguing lately that the feds should establish a different and higher bar -- a novel and unknown requirement for a greater quantum of evidence and proof of a heavier degree of harm -- before Clinton can be prosecuted. They have suggested this merely because she is the likely Democratic presidential nominee.
The public will never stand for that. America has a bedrock commitment to the rule of law. The rule of law means that no one is beneath the law's protections or above its requirements. The DOJ is not in the business of rewriting the law, but the Democrats should get in the business of rethinking Clinton's status as their presumptive presidential nominee, lest a summer catastrophe come their way.
In order to understand this statement, it needs to be parsed, as we need to do in all Clinton scandals.
“This is a security review..” What is “this”? Is “this” an FBI probe, an investigation by the State Department IG, or a DoJ investigation?
“...that was requested...” Who requested the “security review”? Hillary herself? The DoJ? The FBI? The State Department? Any number of intelligence organizations? What Federal agency does a “security review”?
“....it is being carried out...” What is “it”? Is “it” a formal investigation? Who is carrying “it” out? Specifically, what Federal agencies or Legislative entities are carrying out something along the lines of a “security review”?
“....it will be resolved....” Again, what is “it”, how will “it” be “resolved”, and what is the final product to demonstrate that “it” is “resolved”? Could “resolved” mean convening a Federal Grand Jury, or selecting a special prosecutor, or going to trial, or getting a conviction, or sentencing someone for a crime?
Where are the so-called investigative reporters who exercise their precious intellectual curiosity? ::::CRICKETS:::: Paging Bob Woodward - come out of your coma and look into this!
Let’s not confuse the ephemeral of the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy with the actual breaking of laws.
“This is a security review that was requested, it is being carried out, it will be resolved.” Who or what is the basis of Hillary’s emphatic declaration? How does she know this?
NOT this time my friend.. NOT this time, as you will soon see.
And woe to anyone who gets too enthusiastic about this matter because Hillary has a long memory and it will soon be her DoJ.
Exactly. Hitlery would bring the wrath of Hell down upon her enemies and opponents. And not only through the DoJ.
She’d have her own Gestapo.
Sometime in late April or the first week in May, Obama will make a weekday, late afternoon announcement. He will state that indictments have been or shortly will be issued charging Hillary and about 6 aides with multiple crimes. Citing her long service to the country as First Lady, Senator and Sec of State he will says he is issuing her pardons for all but one of the charges. He will state that is not a get out of jail free card however. At the same time Hillary will be appearing in court to plead guilty to the last remaining charge. She will be placed on probation for at least 6 years. While the charge pled to may also disqualify her from holding Federal office one of the terms of probation will be that she not accept or seek any public office Federal, state or local. Several aides will also plead guilty some receiving multiyear prison terms. On his last day in office Obama will pardon Bill and Chelsea for any crimes related to the Clinton Foundation.
I’ll be delighted if that’s the way this plays out!!!
The FBI doesn’t really have any political consequences to fear. Look at Clinton’s support, mostly croaking or heading to nursing homes.
It’s all B.S. She walks. It’s the Clintons. It’s what they do.
If Comey wants to enhance his legacy, he should raffle off the opportunity to place the cuffs on Hillary.
I think HC has the goods on Obama....and The O wants her under the bus....
I misread your post, that is why I asked the moderator to delete it immediately after I realized it.
At worse Hillary will have to pay a fine (say, $100,000) for carelessness and will be cleared of anything criminal.
At this point she may not be a shoo-in for election but is close. Her health could take a sudden turn for the worse. Trump could be killed by some leftist (with or without the connivance of the regime). If Trump is the nominee, a large segment of the Republican Party won't vote for him. If he isn't the nominee, he will either run as an independent, back a different third-party candidate, or simply campaign against the Republican nominee.
In any case it is hard to see a Republican victory in November.
And that arrogant pos won’t. You can count on it.
Dangerous for whom? Shrillary or the careers of the FBI investigators?
Ever the optimist...
bkmk
There seem to me to be a lot of unmentioned intermediate possibilities all having to do with HRC underlings, particularly Huma. The typical strategy of FBI and so on (Watergate special prosecutor?) is IIRC divide and conquer.
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