Like most motions to dismiss, Paul Manafort’s was initially viewed as a long-shot bid to win the political operative his freedom and get out from under the thumb of Special Counsel Robert Mueller.
But after today’s hearing on a motion to dismiss filed by Manafort’s lawyers, it’s looking increasingly likely that Manafort could escape his charges – and finally be free of his ankle bracelets – as judge Amy Berman Jackson questioned Mueller’s “unfettered power” to prosecute over charges that have nothing to do with collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russians.
Berman said she’s concerned Mueller is only pursuing charges against Manafort to pressure him to turn on his former boss, and said the charges against Manafort didn’t stem from Mueller’s collusion probe, but a preexisting case that was nearly brought by the FBI years ago before it was eventually dropped.
Berman has given prosecutors two weeks to show what evidence they have that Manafort was complicit in colluding with the Russians. If they can’t come up with any, she will presumably dismiss the case. She said she would also like to see the letter signed by Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein outlining the scope of the Mueller probe.
Of course, such a dismissal would be nothing short of groundbreaking. It would potentially make it much harder for Mueller to turn witnesses against the president.
Uh-oh precedence if this gets dismissed…. The Judge may single handedly end the cat and mouse games by the special council and would make it much harder for Muller to turn any other parties to his side (because all charges are unrelated to Russia so far)….
— Rob Lee (@WRRob) May 4, 2018
via RSS https://ift.tt/2JVd7xZ Tyler Durden