San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Judge ordered to explain Flynn case decisions
WASHINGTON — A federal appeals court panel has ordered a trial judge to explain why he is hesitating to grant the Justice Department’s request that he dismiss the criminal case against President Trump’s former national security adviser, Michael Flynn.
The order came as the FBI director, Christopher Wray, announced Friday that the bureau would conduct an internal review of the investigation into Flynn, including to “determine whether any current employees engaged in misconduct” and evaluate whether the bureau should change any procedures.
The moves were the latest twists in a bizarre legal and political drama that has enveloped the prosecution of Flynn, who twice pleaded guilty to lying to FBI agents in the Russia investigation about his conversations in December 2016 with the Russian ambassador to the United States.
Flynn’s case has become a political cause for Trump and his supporters. This month, at Attorney General William Barr’s direction, the Justice Department asked the federal judge overseeing the case, Emmet Sullivan, to drop the matter, using as justification a disputed legal theory that
Flynn’s false statements were immaterial to any legitimate investigation.
Barr had earlier intervened to seek a more lenient sentence for another Trump associate prosecuted in connection with the Russia investigation, Roger Stone, than prosecutors had sought. In both cases, Barr’s moves prompted accusations that he was politicizing the department by showing special favor to presidential favorites.
Sullivan responded to the abrupt reversal in the Flynn case by appointing a former prosecutor and retired federal judge in Brooklyn, John Gleeson, to argue against the Justice Department’s new position. He also asked Gleeson to evaluate whether Flynn committed criminal contempt of court in the form of perjury, apparently because Flynn has
made contradictory factual statements under oath in court by admitting he knowingly lied and then saying he did not lie.
On Tuesday, Flynn’s defense lawyer, Sidney Powell, filed a petition with the appeals court seeking an order that would shortcircuit Sullivan’s review. She argued that her client had been mistreated and that the judge was legally required to drop a case if that was what the Justice Department decided to do.
The FBI’s Inspection Division will conduct a review that will “complement” the review already under way at the Justice Department.
The Inspection Division lacks the authority to impose disciplinary action against people no longer employed by the FBI, which covers most of the major players in the Flynn case. A few, however, including the case agent, William Barnett, and one of the agents who interviewed Flynn, Joe Pientka, are still at the bureau.