Government

Mueller Team Accuses Paul Manafort Of Tampering, Asks Judge To Revoke Release

If the investigation is a "witch hunt," Mueller is coming for the brooms.

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Paul Manafort (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

Paul Manafort, Donald Trump’s former campaign manager, has been indicted on a plethora of charges of conspiracy, money laundering, and failure to register as a foreign agent. His chief deputy, Rick Gates, has agreed to cooperate with prosecutors. His ally, Donald Trump, has been distancing himself from Manafort while simultaneously seeming to suggest that there is a pardon waiting for him, should he remain loyal.

Despite the various indictments, Manafort has been out on bail and under house arrest, because he’s being treated as a wealthy white man instead of a poor minority. But apparently Special Counsel Robert Mueller would like to end that charade. In documents filed this evening, Mueller’s office has asked for a hearing to revoke Manafort’s release. Mueller’s team claims Manafort has been engaged in a witness tampering, and therefore violated the conditions of his release.

From the New York Times:

In court documents, prosecutors working for the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, said that Mr. Manafort tried to contact witnesses by phone and through an encrypted messaging program…

An F.B.I. agent, Brock W. Domin, wrote in court documents that at least one witness reported Mr. Manafort’s contact and said that he appeared to be trying to coach their story about Mr. Manafort’s lobbying practices.

What? Please don’t tell me this fool has been trying to suborn perjury using WhatsApp.

Buzzfeed has the filing. Here is a choice nugget:

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“Manafort’s efforts to influence the testimony of potential witnesses, both directly and through an intermediary, threaten ‘the integrity of the trial’ even though those efforts have not been violent in nature and the underlying prosecution involves ‘white-collar’ offenses rather than ‘narcotics’ or violent crimes,”

Okay, that is prosecutor speak for “I know we usually only do this to black people, but this guy here is being unreasonable.”

Scanning through the motion, the allegations against Manafort are shocking:

The day after the Superseding Indictment was made public, Manafort also sent Person D1 a text message on an encrypted application, stating “This is paul.” Domin Decl. ¶ 14.3 Two days later, on February 26, 2018, Manafort used the same encrypted application to send Person D1 a news article describing the Superseding Indictment’s allegations concerning the Hapsburg group, which included the statement that “two European politicians were secretly paid around €2 million by Manafort in order to ‘take positions favorable to Ukraine, including by lobbying in the United States.’”4

One minute after sending the news article, Manafort wrote: “We should talk. I have made clear that they worked in Europe.” Domin Decl. ¶ 15. Toll records for one of Manafort’s phones indicate that Manafort had a short call with Person D1 on February 24, 2018, and that Manafort attempted to call Person D1 again on February 25 and 27, 2018. Id. ¶ 14.

HOW STUPID ARE THESE PEOPLE? Honestly, you are under indictment, you are under house arrest, how are you just going to MAKE A PHONE CALL to a potential witness to try to get them to tell the story you want them to tell? WHO THINKS THAT IS A GOOD IDEA?

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I can’t even think of a good analogy because the stupid is so strong. So, I’ve got to go with the meme game.

Somebody put this guy in lock-up.

Mueller Accuses Paul Manafort of Attempted Witness Tampering [New York Times]
Prosecutors From Mueller’s Team Accuse Paul Manafort Of Trying To Tamper With Potential Witnesses [Buzfeed]

Elie Mystal is the Executive Editor of Above the Law and the Legal Editor for More Perfect. He can be reached @ElieNYC on Twitter, or at elie@abovethelaw.com. He will resist.

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