Missing Flynn document in Mueller file could rile judge at sentencing hearing :
U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan had ordered
the special counsel to turn over all government documents and
“memoranda” related to the questioning of Flynn, after his attorneys
claimed the FBI had discouraged him from bringing a lawyer to his
fateful Jan. 24, 2017 interview with agents at the White House. ...
Mueller met Sullivan’s Friday afternoon deadline and provided documents, some of which were heavily redacted.
Apart
from a new memo from Mueller's team defending the FBI's handling of the
interview -- and saying nothing about the way it was conducted “caused
the defendant to make false statements to the FBI” -- the filing
included a January 2017 memo on Flynn from then-FBI Deputy Director
Andrew McCabe and a "302" (a document memorializing
interviews) detailing a July 19, 2017 interview with then-FBI agent
Peter Strzok. Strzok, one of two agents who interviewed Flynn, described
that meeting in the document, filed Aug. 22 of that year.
But not included in the filing was an original 302 from the period of the January 2017 Flynn interview.
It's
unclear whether the document exists. However, the Strzok interview file
appeared to repeatedly refer to a 302 drafted after the Flynn
interview. "Strzok conducted the interview and [REDACTED] was primarily
responsible for taking notes and writing the FD-302," one section said.
Another said that throughout the interview, Flynn did not give any
indication of deception and only hedged once, "which they documented in
the 302."
James Trusty, a former senior Justice Department
official who now works as a criminal defense attorney at Ifrah Law,
predicted Sullivan would notice that the 302 submitted Friday is dated
seven months after the Flynn interview took place.
“Judge Sullivan
has a well-established history of taking on discovery issues head-on,”
Trusty said. “So providing a seven-month-old FBI 302 is absolutely going
to be a red flag for the judge, and I can’t imagine there are not going
to be questions tomorrow about whether there are contemporaneous notes,
or a contemporaneous report, that is in the FBI’s possession.” ...
Strzok was removed from the Russia probe in late July 2017 -- just
days after he apparently gave the interview that formed the basis for
the 302 in Mueller's filing -- for his apparent anti-Trump bias. No
audio recording or other documentation of Flynn's comments to the FBI
have been produced. ...
Last week, Comey was asked how the FBI agents ended up at the White
House to interview Flynn in the first place. Comey’s response provided
new details about the circumstances that fueled criticism of the
bureau’s conduct:
“I sent them,” Comey said in a panel discussion
with MSNBC’s Nicolle Wallace, and added that it was “something I
probably wouldn’t have done or maybe gotten away with in a
more…organized administration.”
The interview was arranged directly with Flynn, he explained, acknowledging this was not standard procedure.
