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Computer Specialist Who Deleted Clinton Emails May Have Asked Reddit for Tips
US News & World Report ^ | September 19, 2016 | Steven Nelson

Posted on 09/19/2016 2:41:08 PM PDT by Dr.Deth

An army of reddit users believes it has found evidence that former Hillary Clinton computer specialist Paul Combetta solicited free advice regarding Clinton's private email server from users of the popular web forum.

A collaborative investigation showed a reddit user with the username stonetear requested help in relation to retaining and purging email messages after 60 days, and requested advice on how to remove a "VERY VIP" individual's email address from archived content.

The requests match neatly with publicly known dates related to Clinton's use of a private email server while secretary of state.

Stonetear has deleted the posts, but before doing so, the pages were archived by other individuals.

"ARCHIVE EVERYTHING YOU CAN!!!!" a person wrote on a popular thread on the Donald Trump-supporting subreddit r/The_Donald, as the entries disappeared.

There are several reasons to believe the reddit user is indeed Combetta, who was granted immunity by the Justice Department during its investigation of Clinton's private server after he deleted a large number of emails.

The evidence connecting Combetta to the account is circumstantial, but also voluminous. The inactive website combetta.com is registered to the email address stonetear@gmail.com, a search of domain registration information using the service whois.com indicates. An account for a person named Paul Combetta on the web bazaar Etsy also has the username stonetear.

And, perhaps most damningly, there are the dates.

On July 24, 2014, stonetear posted to reddit:

Hello all- I may be facing a very interesting situation where I need to strip out a VIP's (VERY VIP) email address from a bunch of archived email that I have both in a live Exchange mailbox, as well as a PST file. Basically, they don't want the VIP's email address exposed to anyone, and want to be able to either strip out or replace the email address in the to/from fields in all of the emails we want to send out.

I am not sure if something like this is possible with PowerShell, or exporting all of the emails to MSG and doing find/replaces with a batch processing program of some sort.

Does anyone have experience with something like this, and/or suggestions on how this might be accomplished?

On July 23, 2014, the House Select Committee on Benghazi had reached an agreement with the State Department on the production of records, according to an FBI report released earlier this month on the bureau's probe of her email use.

Stonetear posted to reddit on Dec. 10, 2014:

Hello- I have a client who wants to push out a 60 day email retention policy for certain users. However, they also want these users to have a 'Save Folder' in their Exchange folder list where the users can drop items that they want to hang onto longer than the 60 day window.

All email in any other folder in the mailbox should purge anything older than 60 days (should not apply to calendar or contact items of course). How would I go about this? Some combination of retention and managed folder policy?

The FBI report says that Cheryl Mills, a longtime Clinton aide and attorney, requested in December 2014 that the email retention policy be shortened to 60 days. The FBI report says Mills "instructed [redacted] to modify the email retention policy on Clinton's clintonemail.com e-mail account" but that "according to [redacted] he did not make these changes to Clinton's clintonemail.com account until March 2015."

The report says the person, essentially identified as Combetta by The New York Times, realized in late March 2015 that he had not made the retention change and "had an 'oh sh--' moment and sometime between March 25-31, 2015, deleted the Clinton archive mailbox from the [Platte River Networks] server and used BleachBit to deleted [sic] the exported .PST files he had created on the server system containing Clinton's emails."

An email requesting comment sent to stonetear@gmail.com was not immediately returned, nor was a reddit message sent to stonetear, who also posted apparently nonbusiness content to reddit, including a photo of a small plant growing on filthy car-floor carpet and a comment about an aunt who taught middle school math in Detroit.

Last week, Combetta invoked the right not to testify before the House oversight committee, which is probing Clinton's email practices.

A voicemail left with Platte River Networks, Combetta's employer, was not immediately returned. A staffer indicated there had been a significant number of inquiries on the topic.

Ken Eichner, an attorney for the company, tells U.S. News he is acting as a spokesman addressing the matter, and that he would not be able to comment. He did not deny the apparent connection.

"Right now we are respectfully declining all media inquiries," Eichner said. He said there would be no company statement, before hanging up the phone and ignoring a subsequent call.


TOPICS: Breaking News; Crime/Corruption; Government; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: 2014; 201407; 20140724; 201412; 20141210; 201503; clinton; combetta; emails; hillary; hillarysemails; platterivernetworks; reddit; scrubbed; stonetear
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To: Dr.Deth

Paul Combetta will shortly commit suicide by shooting himself six times in the back and then cutting off his own head.


21 posted on 09/19/2016 3:17:28 PM PDT by MeganC (JE SUIS CHARLES MARTEL!!!)
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To: Dr.Deth

This is big. It demolishes Hillary’s defense that there was no intent to hide data, that it was an accident or the result of computer ignorance. The guy she hired to wipe her disk, the one who got immunity and answered no questions, had inquired about the best way to wipe the From: field from a large batch of emails, the From: being Hillary Clinton. This is the smoking gun that could put her in prison or, if Trump is as smart as he seems, will be huge leverage in getting a deal from Hillary and all the other guilty Dems to help via back channels to pass his controversial legislation quickly and with as little fuss as possible.


22 posted on 09/19/2016 3:18:07 PM PDT by Yollopoliuhqui (Smarter - Faster)
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To: Pearls Before Swine

Yep, Prosecutors have been using immunity and the Grand Jury to HIDE CRIMES by the Well Connected FOREVER!!!


23 posted on 09/19/2016 3:23:29 PM PDT by eyeamok (destruction of government records.)
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To: Pearls Before Swine

“The more Machavellian second reason, which has only occurred to me recently, is that it’s a way to hide the truth if the prosecuting authority wishes to. If you grant immunity, and then don’t ask any questions, the information NEVER comes out. It’s like the tree falling in the forest where no one is listening.”

Very astute observation.


24 posted on 09/19/2016 3:24:05 PM PDT by SharpRightTurn (White, black, and red all over--America's affirmative action, metrosexual president.)
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To: Vince Ferrer

Thanks for the update. The original article said his identity as “stonetear” was circumstantial, but the Breitbart article shows his identity to be proven. Let’s see if anything is done about it.


25 posted on 09/19/2016 3:32:22 PM PDT by mass55th (Courage is being scared to death - but saddling up anyway...John Wayne)
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To: Dr.Deth

What is news about this? Don’t we already know he deleted the emails?


26 posted on 09/19/2016 3:47:11 PM PDT by cornfedcowboy
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To: MeganC
Paul Combetta will shortly commit suicide by shooting himself six times in the back and then cutting off his own head.

Paul needs to IMMEDIATELY throw away his cell phone, empty his bank account (cash, small bills), buy a ticket on a Greyhound bus to somewhere faraway, get off half way there, hitchhike to a town 50 miles away, buy a train ticket to somewhere far away, get off half way there, buy a bicycle and a sleeping bag, pedal down the road as far as his legs will take him, throw the bike in a river, walk off into the woods as far as he can go and sit down and PRAY that Hillary doesn't win in November. If she loses he might live to see Christmas. If she wins he's a dead man no matter what he does.
27 posted on 09/19/2016 3:47:46 PM PDT by Garth Tater (What's mine is mine.)
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To: Dr.Deth

I hope this guy gets so much pressure that he rolls over...


28 posted on 09/19/2016 3:55:57 PM PDT by DouglasKC
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To: Dr.Deth

Is that why Reddit has been deleting posts about it?


29 posted on 09/19/2016 4:14:22 PM PDT by TBP (0bama lies, Granny dies.)
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To: grayboots

Three hours ago: https://twitter.com/DRUDGE_REPORT/status/777966680232251392


30 posted on 09/19/2016 4:33:14 PM PDT by Genoa (deplorable)
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To: Dr.Deth
Jill Stein is on it: Kellyanne Conway and 4 others follow Dr. Jill Stein Verified account ‏@DrJillStein 11m11 minutes ago Dr. Jill Stein Retweeted The Hill If it's true that #StoneTear is Clinton's IT specialist Paul Combetta, would that demonstrate intent to destroy evidence? #HillarysEmails Dr. Jill Stein added, The Hill @thehill House committee looking into Reddit post about Clinton's email server http://hill.cm/H8roCNC
31 posted on 09/19/2016 4:44:54 PM PDT by Genoa (deplorable)
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To: Dr.Deth

PFL


32 posted on 09/19/2016 4:48:39 PM PDT by Batman11 ( All Muslims are not terrorists, but almost all terrorists are Muslim)
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To: Dr.Deth

Reddit headline - we’re relevant!
Secondary headline - we finally solved something the feds couldn’t!


33 posted on 09/19/2016 4:50:54 PM PDT by tbw2
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To: Dr.Deth

34 posted on 09/19/2016 5:00:18 PM PDT by doug from upland (She is evil, corrupt, and brain damaged.)
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To: Dr.Deth

Getting longer legs:

https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2016/09/19/discovery-2014-reddit-archive-platte-river-networks-paul-combetta-oh-shit-guy-requesting-tech-help-to-strip-vips-emails/comment-page-4/#comment-2961039


35 posted on 09/19/2016 5:15:40 PM PDT by WildHighlander57 ((WildHighlander57, returning after lurking since 2000)
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To: Dr.Deth

Reddit needs to change their name to ShReddit.


36 posted on 09/19/2016 5:17:15 PM PDT by Pilgrim's Progress (http://www.baptistbiblebelievers.com/BYTOPICS/tabid/335/Default.aspx D)
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To: Dr.Deth

ILLARY memo to Barry Soetoro . . . “Bubbha, when are you going to give away the internet? Hurry up will ya? If you don’t we are BOTH going down . . . and not in a Huma way. You feel me?


37 posted on 09/19/2016 5:22:07 PM PDT by Pilgrim's Progress (http://www.baptistbiblebelievers.com/BYTOPICS/tabid/335/Default.aspx D)
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To: Dr.Deth

So drudge has not picked up on any of this?


38 posted on 09/19/2016 5:27:41 PM PDT by Revel
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To: tbw2

39 posted on 09/19/2016 5:53:49 PM PDT by Dr.Deth
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To: gaijin

Precisely. It’s disgusting.


40 posted on 09/19/2016 5:56:57 PM PDT by Gene Eric (Don't be a statist!)
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