The US Justice Department engaged in a “disturbing pattern of profound investigative missteps” in the process of securing an indictment against former FBI director James Comey, a judge has said.
Magistrate Judge William Fitzpatrick said these “missteps” include “fundamental misstatements of the law” by a prosecutor to the grand jury that indicted Comey in September, the use of potentially privileged communications during an investigation and unexplained irregularities in the transcript of the grand jury proceedings.
He said these issues “led an FBI agent and a prosecutor to potentially undermine the integrity of the grand jury proceeding”.
Mr Fitzpatrick directed prosecutors to provide Comey’s lawyers with all grand jury materials from the case after reviewing the transcript himself and coming away deeply concerned about the integrity of the case.
“The procedural and substantive irregularities that occurred before the grand jury, and the manner in which evidence presented to the grand jury was collected and used, may rise to the level of government misconduct resulting in prejudice to Mr Comey,” the judge said in his order on Monday.
In response, the Justice Department asked for the ruling to be put on hold to give prosecutors time to file objections.
It also said it believed the judge “may have misinterpreted” some facts in issuing his ruling.
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The judge in Comey’s trial, which is scheduled to begin on 5 January, froze the ruling pending the resolution of the government’s objections.
Comey is alleged to have made a false statement to the Senate Judiciary Committee in September 2020 by denying he had authorised the disclosure of information to the media, and that he obstructed a congressional proceeding. He denies the charges.
The charges were brought by Lindsey Halligan, Mr Trump’s former personal attorney, who was installed as the US attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia in September.
Proceedings against Comey began after the US president publicly urged Attorney General Pam Bondi to take action against him and other perceived adversaries.
He wrote on Truth Social: “We can’t delay any longer, it’s killing our reputation and credibility… JUSTICE MUST BE SERVED, NOW!!!”
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Comey was fired months into Mr Trump’s first presidency, in the middle of an investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.
Fellow former FBI chief Robert Mueller took over the investigation, which found numerous contacts between Mr Trump’s 2016 campaign and Russian officials, but concluded that there was not enough evidence to establish a criminal conspiracy.
Mr Trump and his supporters labelled the investigation a “hoax” and a “witch hunt” used to undermine his first administration – despite several government reviews showing that Moscow interfered on behalf of the Republican’s campaign.
