Roger Stone and the Dozens of Search Warrants on Accounts Used to Facilitate the Transfer and Promotion of Stolen Democratic Emails

In response to Roger Stone’s bid to get a new judge, the government has submitted a filing explaining why his case is related to the GRU indictment. It explains that Stone’s alleged false statements pertained to an investigation into links between the Russians who stole Democratic emails, entities who dumped them, and US persons like Stone:

The defendant’s false statements did not arise in a vacuum: they were made in the course of an investigation into possible links between Russian individuals (including the Netyksho defendants), individuals associated with the dumping of materials (including Organization 1), and U.S. persons (including the defendant).

More interestingly, it makes clear that Stone’s communications “with Guccifer 2.0 and with Organization 1” were found in some of the accounts used to transfer and promote the stolen emails.

In the course of investigating that activity, the government obtained and executed dozens of search warrants on various accounts used to facilitate the transfer of stolen documents for release, as well as to discuss the timing and promotion of their release. Several of those search warrants were executed on accounts that contained Stone’s communications with Guccifer 2.0 and with Organization 1.

To be clear: We know that Stone had (innocuous) DMs with both Guccifer 2.0 and WikiLeaks. So this passage is not necessarily saying anything new. But given that Stone’s indictment obscures precisely who his and Jerome Corsi’s go-between with WikiLeaks is, it suggests there may be more direct Stone communications of interest.

Stone will get a sealed description of what those warrants are and — eventually — get the warrants themselves in discovery.

The relevant search warrants, which are being produced to the defendant in discovery in this case, are discussed further in a sealed addendum to this filing.

Meanwhile, Amy Berman Jackson has issued a very limited gag in Stone’s case, prohibiting lawyers from material comments on the case, but gagging Stone only at the courthouse. That said, her gag includes lawyers for witnesses, which would seem to include Jerome Corsi lawyer Larry Klayman.

Counsel for the parties and the witnesses must refrain from making statements to the media or in public settings that pose a substantial likelihood of material prejudice to this case

ABJ does give Stone the following warnings to shut up, however.

This order should not be interpreted as modifying or superseding the condition of the defendant’s release that absolutely prohibits him from communicating with any witness in the case, either directly or indirectly. Nor does this order permit the defendant to intimidate or threaten any witness, or to engage or attempt to engage in any conduct in violation of 18 U.S.C. §1512.

Finally, while it is not up to the Court to advise the defendant as to whether a succession of public statements would be in his best interest at this time, it notes that one factor that will be considered in the evaluation of any future request for relief based on pretrial publicity will be the extent to which the publicity was engendered by the defendant himself.

So the biggest news here might be that Larry Klayman has to shut up.

As I disclosed last July, I provided information to the FBI on issues related to the Mueller investigation, so I’m going to include disclosure statements on Mueller investigation posts from here on out. I will include the disclosure whether or not the stuff I shared with the FBI pertains to the subject of the post. 

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33 replies
  1. Charles says:

    I look forward to Stone’s motion for trial in another venue because excessive publicity in the case has tainted the jury pool, followed by Judge Jackson’s ruling that “relief based on pretrial publicity [is denied based on] the extent to which the publicity was engendered by the defendant himself.”

  2. Buford says:

    hehehe…yeah…He has the “right to remain silent, but not the ability to remain silent”…a line from a movie I cannot recall the title…It seems relevant in Stone’s case…

  3. Areader2019 says:

    condition of the defendant’s release that absolutely prohibits him from communicating with any witness in the case, either directly or indirectly

    Does that include tweeting, public statements, or press conferences?  Could they be considered witness tampering?  Asking for a friend.

  4. ChuckNoblet says:

    From what I can tell this filing could be describing the previously known interactions between Stone and WikiLeaks. Does it necessarily mean there were other communications we don’t know about yet, or does it simply leaving the door open that other communications may (or may not) exist?

    • BobCon says:

      I don’t read it as an indication that there are or aren’t more, but it is hard for me to imagine this is everything they have.

  5. Eureka says:

    A Stone-related FYI before I forget:  re that St Thomas Aquinas tweet about Podesta (prior to the ‘barrel’ tweet):  there’s another one on Oct 6th pm which bolsters your argument about its significance.

    From the timeline portion of The Universe of Hacked and Leaked Emails from 2016: Podesta Emails :

    August 15: In first tweet mentioning John Podesta, Stone claims John Podesta “makes Paul Manafort look like St. Thomas Aquinas”

    October 6: Corsi repeats the Joule/GAI claims
    (your internal link to Corsi post removed)

    From the archive, Oct 6th pm Stone tweet with a twitter short url (broken with ellipses below) which goes to same Corsi post you linked:

    Oct 6, 2016 10:02:38 PM The gang around Hillary makes @PaulManafort look like St. Thomas Aquinas https:  (…)    //t.co/npS7oONbRh [TweetDeck]

    i.e. Joule attack on the mind.

  6. Herringbone says:

    @ Buford, 5:01 pm
    There’s also the famous Carol Burnett line:
    “Ve have vays of making you stop talking.”

  7. punaise says:

    @Richieboy

    Yeah, tough to stick the landing on that one. Pretty sure the Bulgarian judge has it in for me.

    • BobCon says:

      Without sinking into searching through that abyss, I have to assume LaRouche provided foot soldiers for Stone. LaRouchies were key astroturf for the Tea Party protests that the media liked to cover.

      The LaRouchies were so nuts that you’d occasionally see the media forced to acknowledge that their narrative about  simple folk worried about the government maybe was BS, but they’d always drop it, and now their role in the Tea Party is left out of the story.

      They have been part of other dirty trick campaigns for decades, and I hope they wither away, although somebody else willl no doubt take their place.

  8. Zinsky says:

    It is so gratifying that these slime merchants (Stone, Corsi, Klayman et al), are finally facing their day of reckoning, after literally decades of fouling the body politic with their lies, half-truths and slanderous treatment of decent civil servants. The damage they have done to the free, open and honest marketplace of ideas is incalculable. May they all burn in Hell.

  9. Michael says:

    Whatever happened to Andrew Miller’s challenge of his subpoena? It’s been 3 months since the Appeals Court heard his case, and most of the issues Miller’s lawyers raised would have been moot when Barr took over. You’d think that his appeal would have been denied yesterday.

  10. Rapier says:

    RE BobCon and the abyss

    Peering into the abyss that was Lyndon LaRouche is a useful enterprise. Useful first as a cautionary tale about how an extremely rational mind can go right around the bend and then how an affinity for ideology itself can play out as swinging from one pole to the other. His own journey Left to Right mirrored in ‘successes’ like bringing together at one point young Jewish New Lefties and KKK types in Holocaust denial.

    In America and really the West this sort of thing has predominately played out after WWII as a swing from the Left to the hard right. While not nuts the road from Troskyites to avowedly rightest Neocon by Podhoretz and Irving Kristol tells a similar tale.

    I wouldn’t judge LaRouhe a grifter although that may have been the case. However his ability to continually attract new followers and cumulatively millions of dollars over 60 years is a case study, writ small and wacked, in the rise of what is now called Conservatism.

  11. Leila512 says:

    @Michael

    @emptywheel

    @Rayne

    Per Michael, am wondering what has happened to Andrew Miller lawsuit, and how it may/may not play in Mueller’s ongoing efforts?

    • Rayne says:

      I don’t have anything firm on Miller’s suit. Marcy may have but she’s got a lot on her plate.

      Last I saw:

      …Stone aide Andrew Miller, who was paid $9,000 by the PAC, was also subpoenaed by Mueller but refused to testify, instead being held in contempt of court. Miller’s attorney Alicia Dearn said he wanted “some grant of immunity” to discuss financial transactions involving political action committees related to Stone. …

      source: A look back at Roger Stone’s ‘big league scam’ super PAC, 25-JAN-2019

      34 persons charged to date by SCO (not including SDNY’s indictments spun off by SCO) and none of the U.S. citizens indicted really had a solid case against SCO’s legitimacy. IMO, Miller’s case is weak.

  12. Reader 21 says:

    @Rayne thanks for the Miller update; was just wondering about that dude.    ICYMI Maddow posed a good question—how does a Missouri house-painter afford some of the highest priced (which is saying something) legal talent in Washington DC.   Which, appropos of nothing at all, made me think of Leonard Leo and the Federalist Society and their overflowing coffers—at least some of which may be ill-gotten…

    PS.  Listened to the recent EW interview on Pod Save; excellent as always.

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