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Roger Stone's long awaited indictment was finally dropped on Friday and landed on Stone like a ton of bricks. As a person who sued Libby Scooter and other people under similar charges and defended white-collar actions involving charges similar to those alleged here – misrepresentations, obstruction of justice and tampering with witnesses – I think Stone should begin to put order in his affairs. Except for a presidential pardon (always the possibility of joking with a POTUS like Trump), Stone will be sentenced and sentenced to a very heavy prison sentence. It is as close to a crazy affair as that of a prosecutor.
Several types of defenses are generally used to defend a case like this, and none of them is viable here.
"I did not really say what the government claims to have said / the government did not understand what I said."
This defense can often work when misrepresentations are based on an interview conducted by field agents who simply take notes of the interview and do not record it. In these cases, the accused may reasonably argue that they did not understand the agents' questions or that they did not understand or memorize their answers accurately. Any ambiguity in the question or answer can be exploited. But that will not work for Stone, because the whole audience of Congress has been transcribed, word for word. The questions and answers were sworn and were neither ambiguous nor interpretable.
"You can not prove that my answer was wrong".
In other words, cast doubt on the government's version. what he claims is the truth. To do that, we can generally attack the credibility of government witnesses who are supposed to establish what the government actually supports. So, for example, if the government relied on Randy Credico or Jerome Corsi to tell the truth to the jury, Stone's board could attack their credibility. Even the most direct witnesses may be subject to contradictory questioning. (If you doubt, describe how Tim Russert, perhaps the most famous journalist in America at the time, knotted himself during his cross-examination during his testimony in the Libby trial. nice.)
Unfortunately for Stone, and what makes the fight in this case useless, is that the government will not need to rely on the credibility of an individual to defend his cause. The electronic and textual evidence exhibited in the indictment is not interpretable. For example, the same day Stone stated that he had never sent or received any email or SMS from Credico, the two men had exchanged more than 30 SMS messages. Good luck for that.
" Stone is too untrustworthy for any prosecutor to ever be able to rely on.
And if that were not enough – and believe me, the case will be judged in Washington There is an easy criticism that the Liberals are soft on crime. This may be true when the accused are perceived as belonging to a disadvantaged minority. But have pity on an arrogant, white-collar defendant who jokes with a despised Republican president; you will witness the righteous fury. The coming of D.C. insults Trump and finds odious Stone. The only controversy will be in jury selection, as potential jurors are all struggling to be chosen so that they can "do justice".
Finally, do not expect Special Advocate Robert Mueller to overturn Stone's decision and have him cooperate. . An accused such as Stone is far more boring than a prosecutor. Stone is too untrustworthy for a prosecutor to rely on him. He told so many documented lies and boasted so often about his dirty tricks that he just had too much baggage to handle, even if he wanted to cooperate, which seems unlikely anyway. I suspect that Mueller would not even be willing to make a preliminary report with Stone just to test the possibility of cooperation, fearing that Stone would immediately go on TV with his Fox News friends to decry Mueller's tactic about the Gestapo .
In short, Mueller does not need Stone to go to see anyone else and, even if he did, he could not rely on what Stone did to him. had said. Stone has nothing to sell that Mueller would be interested in buying.
Stone clearly loves being in the spotlight now. He should enjoy it while he can. His remaining years will not be so enjoyable.
Peter Zeidenberg is a former federal prosecutor and special assistant legal counsel in the Libby Scooter lawsuits. He is currently associated in white collar at Arent Fox, Washington, D.C. Follow him @przeidenberg .
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