One of the comments to that Blue Sky post:
They can indict a ham sandwich but apparently are too incompetent and evil to indict Mr. Comey
Oh wow.
That means the foreperson signed the 3 count indictment and the prosecutor used that signature and tacked it to the 2 count “true bill” and handed it to the Judge. It still shakes out the same (Comey was charged with the same two counts the grand jury found probable cause for), but good lord is that a misrepresentation of what happened in the grand jury proceeding. This case is over and so is an attorneys license.
“The Democrats are the party that says government will make you smarter, taller, richer, and remove the crabgrass on your lawn. The Republicans are the party that says government The Rule of Law doesn’t work and then they get elected and prove it.”
–Conservative author, PJ O’Rourke (deceased)
whoa. i knew it looked like it was headed there, wow, that is serious malpractice. heads should be rolling. i doubt they will.
from cnn:
• Bombshell about grand jury: Interim US Attorney Lindsey Halligan took the stand briefly Wednesday, saying only two grand jurors reviewed the final indictment it handed up against former FBI Director James Comey. Comey’s attorney then argued Halligan’s testimony indicates, “there is no indictment” against his client.
In a shocking back and forth, prosecutors said that instead of presenting a new indictment to the grand jury after it declined to approve one of the counts, Halligan simply brought an altered version to the magistrate’s courtroom for the grand jury’s foreperson to sign.
ms halligan did dodge the forgery thing.
This is the scene from the movie Office Space where the camera pans around to face Lumberg who went from in control to in trouble. Where once Comey was the accused in trouble, the camera has panned around to Halligan who must take the stand as her case is in flames. All in a few weeks.
what was really incredible was that she interrupted the judge! she seriously does not understand the danger she is in.
from cnn:
Judge Michael Nachmanoff quickly called Halligan, who was the only prosecutor who presented the case to the grand jury, to the lectern, asking her to confirm that the entire grand jury was never presented the altered indictment.
The judge started, “Am I correct -”
“No, you’re not,” Halligan interrupted. She said that there was one additional grand juror in the magistrate’s courtroom and quoted her back-and-forth with that judge.
“I’m familiar with the transcript,” Nachmanoff said. He then told her to sit down.
Calling Lemons back to the stand, Nachmanoff asked: Am I correct that the new document was never presented to the grand jury for approval?
Lemons carefully responded, “I wasn’t there, but that is my understanding.”
Comey’s attorney Michael Dreeben then argued to the judge that, given the testimony of the prosecutor, “no indictment was returned.”
“There is no indictment,” he said, adding that the statute of limitations has now elapsed against Comey on charges of lying to Congress.
Last comment, but this is a situation where the coverup is much worse than the “crime”.
The problem is you can’t have two different “living” indictments but only present one to grand jury. One at a time, the same one you start with has to be the one you end with.
Had Halligan just presented the 3-count indictment to the grand jury, they true billed 2 counts and no billed the third, cross out the no bill count/whatever, foreperson and Halligan sign it to reflect reality of what happened, hand to the Judge, then while sloppy and a lil different than the norm, there’s no substantive problem. Trump would get mad because everyone would now know she “lost” on a count, but I don’t think there would be a real legal problem. There’s one messy indictment - the same one presented to the grand jury.
Halligan did kind of attempt to do that (it tries to remove a count). But now we know, she also created another entirely fictitious clean 2 count “true bill” which was never presented to the grand jury, and gave to the Judge claiming it was the actual indictment presented to the grand jury (it must be presented to grand jury). If she wanted the clean version to be the new “living” indictment, then you have to go back and re-present the updated indictment to the grand jury.
To be sure, it could play out that way.
I’d expect Halligan to argue that - as a newbie - she thought that she needed to prepare a clean bill without the line item that had been ruled out. But that’s a clerical issue and that the original bill was reviewed by the whole grand jury, was approved on two counts, was signed, and was presented to the judge. As regards that original bill, there’s nothing that’s technically out of order.
I think the question would purely come down on whether she did or did not present the first indictment to the judge. She did. He - in a sense - turned it away…
But, yeah, I think that the case will get dismissed for procedural issues.
And then Halligan will get sanctioned…
What was the joke about how Trump lawyers always end up needing their own lawyers?
M.A.G.A.
My Attorneys Got Attorneys
Making attorneys get attorneys, yeah.
the trouble comes in because of the 2 indictments given by ms halligan to the magistrate from the grand jury, they do not show count one failed to find probable cause and the other 2 with probable cause. she gave the judge one indictment that failed to find probable cause as to any count. all three counts, not just one, any count. she gave the judge a second indictment that showed probable case on 2 counts without mention of the failed count.
if she had given the judge the indictment that had one no bill count and 2 true counts, that matched the 2nd indictment with the 2 true billed counts she would not be in this much trouble.
she handed in one with 3 no billed counts, and one with 2 true billed counts.
that is what confused the magistrate judge that night. that is what blew up in the last few days.
trump keeps adding names to the disbarred attorney list.
I’ll add that you never know what might have happened had she properly represented it to the grand jury. Maybe they true bill the same two counts quickly. But maybe not.
For Halligan, the statute of limitations runs out in a few hours so this must happen that day. Assuming the grand jury is still even there……It’s late in the day. They barely had enough votes to true bill (12-10? after a 2hr deliberation for probable fucking cause). Maybe the one or two members of the grand jury felt better when it was 2 true, one dismiss, and now are tired and fed up, want to leave, and now those two counts are no billed, or one. While I appreciate the big picture, it is a little more than procedural to have to do this - the grand jury is literally voting again to indict or not and the vote was very close on the true bills.
We’ll never know.
Draining the swamp!
Halligan had concepts of an indictment.
I wondered if she was just a pretty face dragged into Demento Don’s administration. She’s pretty much full on MAGA. Runs in family. She took the lead in 'cleansing ’ Smithsonian exhibits contrary to 1950s (1850s?) sensibilities. Appears she has no regrets being thrust into the Comey and James cases to advance Dear Leader’s revenge tour. Fortunately there’s a lot of incompetent sycophants mannig the current staff. Basically running afoul of the law and previous investigations/opinions that came up empty.
That danger is more than three years away. The danger of refusing orders to indict the dictator’s enemies is a lot closer.
What’s going to happen if the charges against Comey are dismissed? Does Trump just celebrate that the John Bolton case is moving forward, and accept that few if any of his enemies are going to prison?
Perhaps I’m guilty of just asking questions. But I really do not know the answers, except that defying a dictator, even a plain old fashioned non-fascist dictator like Donald Trump, is risky.
Thank you for the link. That helped clear things up a bit. A really good time line.
Turns out that there was nothing in writing that has no bill for count one and true bill for count 2 and 3.
After deliberations the foreperson told the grand jury coordinator that there wasn’t enough votes for count one. The entire document was marked as no bill on all counts from the grand jury.
Somehow news got to ms halligan’s office that there wasn’t enough votes on count one but that there was a tight vote for two and three.
Halligan’s office drafted the 2 count indictment and showed it to the foreperson and one other member of the grand jury, got the foreperson to sign it and presented that to the court. She also had the foreperson pencil in on the no bill indictment, that it should only be no bill on count one. This was not done in the presence of the grand jury.
The operative document is the redrafted that the grand jury did not see.
There never was anything in writing that the grand jury saw, voting no bill on 1 and true bill on 2 and 3. Just a statement to the jury coordinator and discussions with ms Halligan and the foreperson and 1 grand jury member.
Since this can’t possibly be accepted as a legitimate prosecution (can it?) does this mean that another attempt can’t be made because of the statute of limitations? Is Comey walking here?
Apparently maybe yes, maybe no.
According to Ken White aka Popehat (former AUSA, current defense lawyer & legal blogger/podcaster) if the indictment is dismissed it extends the statute of limitations by six months. But in this case the indictment might be dismissed with prejudice in which case that’s irrelevant as “dismissal with prejudice” just means the state (or plaintiff if it’s a civil case) doesn’t get another kick at the can. He suggests that if the case were dismissed based on Halligan not being properly appointed, that might be a dismissal without prejudice and the state might be able to re-indict. But if the case were dismissed based on prosecutorial misconduct such as vindictive prosecution then it would likely be with prejudice and that would be the end of it.
Note that even in the event this case makes it to trial, the government’s case is horribly weak and a conviction would be a huge surprise. Comey is almost certainly walking regardless of the outcome of all this pre-trial stuff.
I have to say, this is all very delicious. It’s possible the only thing that saves democracy is the gross incompetence of this administration.