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The trial of Donald Trump's long-time advisor is now scheduled to begin on November 5 and is expected to last about two weeks, said Judge Amy Berman Jackson of the US District Court in Washington.
Stone pleaded not guilty to seven charges of obstructing, lying in front of Congress and falsifying witnesses. He was released on bail after his arrest seven weeks ago.
The trial is scheduled in nine months, in part because of the amount of evidence that Stone's team must fully understand and can argue before the trial. Prosecutors have already sent nine terabytes of data to the defense team, they said in court.
"We could stack the monument as high as the Washington Monument twice," Stone's lawyer Robert Buschel told the judge.
But the question of whether Stone broke his orders – with the publication in 2019 of his book on the 2016 election in which he attacked Mueller's investigation – has remained suspended in his recent proceedings.
The judge left the issue unresolved Thursday during the brief hearing.
"I have not really had the opportunity, since filing the complaint, to study the exhibits in detail, and I will continue to review them," Jackson said in court.
The judge, in previous written orders, had obviously been dissatisfied with the availability of the book and told him that he had crossed a line, which she had already told him not to cross.
The case is being handled jointly by Mueller's attorneys and by the prosecutors of the DC's US Attorney's Office.
While Stone was initially allowed to speak publicly about his case, Jackson slapped him with a planned but limited gag order. A few minutes before his arrival on February 15, Stone realized that the book, which was already available from the booksellers, could irritate the judge.
During President's Day weekend, Stone promoted the book online and also posted on Instagram a threatening photo of the judge with the line of fire on his shoulder. She quickly demanded that he come from his Florida home for a trial in Washington and ordered him on February 21 not to talk about his case, the court or Mueller as long as his charges were pending. In the hours and days following this hearing, Stone's team of lawyers discussed the possible fit between the book and the revised and stricter gag order. They had not raised the issue with her at the hearing.
"Any violation of this order will be grounds to revoke your bond and detain you pending your trial," Jackson told Stone Gag order more strict. "So I want to be clear: today I gave you a second chance, but it is not baseball, there will be no third chance."
Stone's team then waited a week to inform the court of the publication of his paperback on the election of President Donald Trump.
"I am now blacklisted by the Crooked Special Prosecutor Robert Mueller because I have been counseling Donald Trump for forty years," says Stone in a new introduction, written this year before his arrest. "Clearly, I've been targeted for strictly political reasons."
Until now, Jackson has criticized Stone's team for not informing him earlier of the book and has suggested that the late filing of his case in court be intended to generate sales of books – which were minimal, according to the publisher's e-mails.
"There is no doubt that the order prohibits and continues to prohibit the defendant from making public statements, regardless of the support chosen, about the investigation," Jackson wrote to Stone last week, after his legal team first announced the availability of the book. "The costs or consequences that will result from the reiteration by the court of this clear requirement at this late date are also attributable to the defendant."
Responding to the court Monday, Stone's team said that it would have been "a little embarrassing" to mention the book at the notice hearing. The legal team insisted that Stone had never intended to violate the order or hide Jackson's release of the book. "Having been scolded, we are only trying to defend Mr. Stone and move forward without further delay," they wrote.
February e-mails between Stone's lawyers and his publisher revealed their concern that Jackson may decide to throw Stone out of jail for breaking the order.
"The mere publication of new parts of the book could lead Roger into jail for contempt of court," wrote Grant Smith, one of Stone's lawyers, in an email that his legal team had included in his latest filing at judge.
On Thursday, Jackson noted that Stone's lawyers, according to their emails, intended to get acquainted with the issue of publishing the book after it had set the deposit. She nonetheless reminded Stone that he had to follow his orders and that his lawyers, from Florida, had to abide by the rules of the court based in Washington, DC.
"There is no exception for clumsy people," she says. "I'm waiting for compliance," said Jackson.
An attorney from the special attorney's office told the judge that some of the defense team's explanations about the book's release were inconsistent.
Thursday's hearing drew a lot less people than Manafort the day before, although a prosecutor who does not usually attend Stone's hearings, Andrew Weissmann, came to watch him.
Weissmann presented the closing arguments when Manafort was convicted on Wednesday and had largely conducted this key lawsuit under Mueller.
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