The move comes after the president and his allies stepped up their assault on the legal case against the former national security adviser.
The Justice Department has abandoned its prosecution of President Donald Trump’s former national security adviser Michael Flynn, throwing in the towel on one of the most prominent cases brought by special counsel Robert Mueller.
Flynn pleaded guilty in 2017 to lying to the FBI about his dealings with the Russian ambassador to the U.S.
But department officials, including Attorney General William Barr, concluded in light of recently disclosed evidence that the FBI’s questioning of him just four days after Trump’s inauguration lacked a proper investigative basis.
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The bombshell court filing asking U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan to dismiss the case bore the signature of only one prosecutor: U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Timothy Shea, a former Barr aide named to the post in January.
Moments before Shea’s filing, the top prosecutor in the Flynn case withdrew abruptly and without explanation. Brandon Van Grack, who served as one of special counsel Robert Mueller’s top lawyers and remained on the Flynn case even after Mueller’s office closed down, signaled his exit from the case in a terse, one-sentence filing with U.S. Sullivan.
In another sign of discord, the prosecutor who handled the matter alongside Van Grack over the past year — Assistant U.S. Attorney Jocelyn Ballentine — was also absent from the filing seeking to drop the case.
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In recent weeks and months, Flynn’s defense — headed by Texas lawyer Sidney Powell — had escalated its attacks on Van Grack personally, alleging that he withheld evidence favorable to Flynn in defiance of an order from Sullivan requiring the prosecution to turn over such material.
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The filings also did not indicate whether Van Grack was directed to withdraw from the Flynn case or elected to do so.
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- Discussion
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If Mike Flynn is the answer, I cannot begin to fathom the question. https://t.co/7T27TKue3e
— Jeff Timmer (@jefftimmer) May 8, 2020
Since the motion to dismiss the case was signed by the new US Atty in DC, who came there straight from a job as an advisor to AG Barr, with no signatures from career prosecutors as would be usual, I look forward to his explanation to the court.
— Joyce Alene (@JoyceWhiteVance) May 8, 2020
I had to fire General Flynn because he lied to the Vice President and the FBI. He has pled guilty to those lies. It is a shame because his actions during the transition were lawful. There was nothing to hide!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 2, 2017
An important point to remember in why Flynn is being rewarded: He never gave up the missing piece of the puzzle which is whether Trump knew about or directed the call to Kislyak. Mueller said he couldn't get to bottom of it, because Flynn and McFarland claimed to not remember.
— Susan Hennessey (@Susan_Hennessey) May 7, 2020
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