The Justice Department could present a new indictment against James Comey to a grand jury as quickly as this week.
People aware of the state of affairs contained in the Justice Department imagine no matter comes subsequent might occur shortly, and that it doesn’t matter what, prosecutors will doubtless present new indictments against the previous FBI director and New York Attorney General Letitia James to grand juries within the Eastern District of Virginia.
The earlier instances against Comey and James had been dismissed final week after a choose discovered that interim US Attorney Lindsey Halligan didn’t have the authority of a prosecutor when the indictments had been returned in late September and early October.
Comey had beforehand pleaded not responsible to prices that he lied to Congress 5 years in the past. James pleaded not responsible to mortgage fraud-related prices.
After the dismissals of their cases, FBI Director Kash Patel stated over the weekend that “multiple responses” could come as early as “right after Thanksgiving” within the dismissed case against Comey.
Grand juries sit a number of instances a week usually within the Alexandria federal courthouse, and fewer incessantly in Norfolk, the place James’ prices had been centered round.
During an interview Saturday with the right-wing media outlet Epoch Times, Patel was requested for his response to the case against Comey being dismissed.
“We the FBI, and our partners at the DOJ, have numerous options to proceed, and we’re executing on all those options,” Patel stated. “So we’re not done.”
“I would say stay tuned for right after Thanksgiving and you’ll see multiple responses, in my opinion,” he added.
Comey’s congressional obstruction prices had been dismissed final week by a trial-level choose reviewing Halligan’s authority.
Cameron McGowan Currie discovered that Halligan didn’t have the authority to be the Eastern District of Virginia’s US Attorney as a result of she hadn’t been confirmed by the Senate or sworn in by the district’s judges. The choose additionally determined the indictments against James and Comey, which she alone secured from Alexandria-based grand juries, had been invalid.
The White House press secretary and the Attorney General each stated an enchantment of the ruling, which might put the 2 felony instances earlier than the 4th US Circuit Court of Appeals, was imminent, but the Justice Department hasn’t notified the court docket that it plans to enchantment as of Monday afternoon.
According to federal procedural guidelines, the Justice Department has 30 days –which means the week of Christmas – to notify the court docket of its intention to enchantment.
The Justice Department could determine it needs to strive once more to safe a grand jury’s approval of prices against Comey, earlier than deciding whether or not to enchantment.
Comey’s authorized protection crew has a number of methods lined up to doubtlessly problem a re-indicted case him once more, if it had been to be revived.
Comey’s lead protection counsel Patrick Fitzgerald stated in a assertion final week that the choose’s determination to dismiss the case “indicates that because the indictment is void, the statute of limitations has run and there can be no further indictment.”
Comey’s crew is probably going to preserve that authorized place going ahead, arguing that any prices he may face associated to his September 2020 congressional testimony would now come outdoors of the five-year window, referred to as a statute of limitations, that the Justice Department had to carry a case.
Currie, in her opinion final week, indicated in a footnote she agreed with that argument, saying that every thing Halligan did earlier than the grand jury was invalid, together with her presentation to the grand jury.
But the Justice Department seems to imagine it would nonetheless revive the case below one other legislation that could permit a number of months to cost the case once more, basically elongating the statute of limitations for Comey into spring 2026, sources have informed NCS.
As for the James mortgage fraud case, it too could be revived — and doesn’t face the identical doable points round a statute of limitations window closing.
James’ legal professionals had been at first levels of difficult the specifics of her indictment and would doubtless proceed opposing any case that was introduced below Halligan.
James’ protection lawyer Abbe Lowell has additionally represented one other consumer difficult a completely different interim US Attorney’s skill to serve with out Senate affirmation. After the third US Circuit Court of Appeals selected Monday that Alina Habba just isn’t the appearing US Attorney for New Jersey, handing Lowell a win there, he to vowed carry ahead instances difficult prosecutors within the Justice Department.
“We will continue to challenge President Trump’s unlawful appointments of purported U.S. Attorneys wherever appropriate,” Lowell stated.
A spokesperson for Lowell declined to remark additional on what could also be subsequent in James’ case.
Some authorized consultants are intently watching precisely how the Justice Department strikes ahead, and the extent of involvement Halligan would have within the instances, now that a trial-level choose stated she had been unlawfully appointed.
“They can reindict. The question is who can do it. They’ll have to have a different person managing that indictment process,” stated John Day, a Nashville protection lawyer and present president of the American College of Trial Lawyers, a company that acknowledges preeminent trial legal professionals.
Day stated he believed probably the most legally sound transfer the Justice Department could make can be one the Trump administration isn’t making: Having Halligan step down.
“It’s a procedural morass. The uncertainty that all of these machinations have created is sort of alarming,” Day stated. “It’s all in this place because the administration has decided it does not want to proceed under normal order.”
NCS’s Evan Perez and Hannah Rabinowitz contributed to this report.