Posted on 05/23/2020 2:46:59 PM PDT by CaptainK
Veteran trial lawyer Beth Wilkinson is helping guide U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan as a federal appeals court questions his plan to probe the U.S. Justice Department’s decision to dismiss the case against former Trump national security adviser Michael Flynn despite his admission he lied to the FBI.
Sullivan refused to immediately dismiss the charge against Flynn, a retired Army general who served for just weeks in Trump’s White House, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit is now weighing whether the longtime Washington federal trial judge overstepped his authority.
The appeals court set a June 1 deadline for Sullivan to respond to a petition from Flynn’s lawyers that seeks the immediate dismissal of the case. Sullivan, meanwhile, has appointed an outside lawyer, John Gleeson, a former federal judge in Brooklyn, to make arguments against the Justice Department’s bid to ditch the prosecution. Flynn pleaded guilty in 2017 to lying to the FBI about his communications with the Russian ambassador to the U.S., but he later hired new lawyers to help him withdraw his acknowledgement of wrongdoing.
Wilkinson, a co-founder of the litigation boutique Wilkinson Walsh, confirmed Saturday she had been retained by Sullivan, who has served on Washington’s federal trial court since 1994. The Washington Post first reported Wilkinson’s role advocating for the judge.
Wilkinson has long been in the spotlight in Washington legal circles and beyond as a successful defense-side trial lawyer advocating for major U.S. companies. She left the law firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison in 2016 to start the boutique, which has offices in Washington, New York and Los Angeles.
She has frequently taken on high-profile assignments. In 2018, she was hired by Brett Kavanaugh, then a U.S. Supreme Court nominee, to help shepherd him through confirmation proceedings at which he had been accused of a decades-old sexual misconduct allegation. Kavanaugh, who denied the claim, was confirmed to the high court.
More recently, Wilkinson was retained by Summer Zervos in a suit in New York state court that accuses Trump of lying in his denials that he did not grope and kiss her without consent in 2007. The case is pending.
In the D.C. Circuit now, Wilkinson is counsel to Cheryl Mills, a former aide to then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in a dispute over a deposition in a public-records case. One of Sullivan’s colleagues on the bench, U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth, said the plaintiff—the conservative advocacy group Judicial Watch—could depose Clinton and Mills.
.Sullivan’s move to appoint Gleeson, now a partner at Debevoise & Plimpton, to oppose the Justice Department’s move to dismiss was seen by some observers as an assertion of independence of the courts as a co-equal branch of government. Still others said Sullivan had assumed too powerful a role, and that he should have dismissed the case at the Justice Department’s request.
Legal scholars are divided over how much power Sullivan holds to scrutinize the Justice Department’s charging decisions. Federal rules do not allow prosecutors to unilaterally dismiss any criminal case. They need “leave of court” before a charge can be withdrawn.
At one time, Flynn was prepared to be punished, but he agreed to further cooperate with the special counsel’s Russia investigation in an effort to secure a non-jail sentence. During Flynn’s first scheduled sentencing, Sullivan raised the prospect that Flynn might go to prison for lying to federal agents.
Timothy Shea, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia and a former close adviser to Barr, asked Sullivan to dismiss the case against Flynn on the ground that prosecutors no longer believe there was a strong basis to justify the FBI’s 2017 interview that is central to the false-statements claim. Former Justice Department officials have disputed the government’s claim there was no ground to interview Flynn.
Oh you silly, silly man....
So is he corrupt or seeking cover from a firestorm ?
Keeping Flynn quiet must be of huge importance to the coup. Why else would this continue? If Flynn were a democrat his story would have been on the front page of the Times, gag order or not.
It appears Ms. Wilkinson pleads both political sides. Not necessarily a bad thing, but interesting. She had Brett Kavanaugh as a client, but now has Cheryl Mills and Judge Sullivan.
Although, why Sullivan needs a lawyer escapes me. Doesn’t he have clerks? They can argue along whatever lines he tells them to. And, if he doesn’t know what lines to argue along, he should let Flynn go.
Gets stranger and stranger.
...er, uh, woman....
Who pays? Got a mirror?
This article manages to leave out a lot of details that would put Flynn in a better light, like that the two FBI guys who interviewed him on January 24, 2017, did not think that he was lying.
Scumbag NBC Host David Gregory is Lawyer Wilkinson’s Husband. What’s Sullivan’s fricking problem lawyering up?
The fix is in Emmett! You are kaput!!
They want trump to jump in and pardon him making flynn in there eyes guilty
We do, of course.
I’ve read the authority cited in the appellate order, Fokker Services (yes, that’s the name of the case.) yes, the facts are different but I see no reason why the Same law would not apply on these facts as well. Essentially the “leave of court” requirement is just a rubber stamp... prosecutorial decisions are vested in the prosecutor and the prosecutor only. The
Appellate court could not be signaling their intention to issue the writ more clearly. I think hiring an attorney is just for show, rather than blatantly turning tail and slinking into the shadows. If I’m wrong I’ll be prepared to eat the proverbial crow. But I’m not.
I wonder is she was as effective an attorney for Kavanaugh as Gen Flynn’s original lawyers?
Never trust any deep staters who “appear” to be advocating for our side.
If he didn’t do anything wrong, then why does he need a lawyer.
If he didn’t do anything wrong, then why does he need a lawyer.
Looks like Obama’s lackey is hiring a deep state attorney to write his response causing more delay. This is certain to alarm and anger the appellate panel as their order was an opportunity for Sullivan to dismiss the case rendering the motion for Writ of Mandamus moot.
Now Sullivan is having his response written for him causing as much delay as possible.
I’ll say it again, Sullivan is not in control, he has a gun to his head.
The hammer about to fall on this judicial idiot and its going to leave a mark.
Similar to the way they described the Judge Kavanaugh inquisition......no mention of the fallacious accusation, just, “Kavanaugh denied it”.
He’s been ordered by the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals to “file a response addressing the petitioners’ request.” Judge Sullivan has 10 days to address Flynn’s legal brief. Why would he need a personal lawyer to do that?
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