An IRS officer admits to having entrusted Michael Cohen's financial statements to Stormy's attorney

February 21, 2019, 21:13 GMT

By Andrew Blankstein and Tom Winter

Federal prosecutors said that an investigator from the IRS California had admitted to having leaked confidential details of financial transactions by Trump's former lawyer, Michael Cohen, to Michael Avenatti, Stormy Daniels' attorney .

John C. Fry was indicted in federal court for having researched and released reports of suspicious activity (SAR) reports that banks file when they note potentially suspicious transactions.

Federal officials said they found phone records indicating that Fry had made a call from his personal cell phone to that of Stormy Daniels' lawyer, Michael Avenatti, the day before Avenatti had released details of financial transactions. from Cohen.

The federal complaint indicates that Fry verbally admitted having provided the information to Avenatti when he was confronted with federal agents.

Avenatti shared via Twitter information on the $ 500,000 Cohen received in 2017 from Columbus Nova, a Russian billionaire-related company, and payments to a Cohen company called Essential Consultants, sourced from other companies. companies doing business with the federal government, including AT & T and aircraft manufacturer.

After the disclosure of Avenatti, the office of the Inspector General of the Treasury Department announced that he would investigate the origin of his information.

Fry, 54, is an investigative analyst at the law enforcement service of the IRS, the Criminal Investigations Division. He has been working for the IRS since 2008.

According to the complaint, he allegedly did a lot of research on Cohen and would have downloaded five SARs, including one for a bank account of Essential Consultants.

In a statement, Avenatti told NBC News: "I did not do anything wrong and did not violate any law, in the same way that journalists do not break the law in the line of duty."