{"id":359275,"date":"2025-11-06T07:12:26","date_gmt":"2025-11-06T07:12:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/359275\/"},"modified":"2025-11-06T07:12:26","modified_gmt":"2025-11-06T07:12:26","slug":"judge-in-comey-case-orders-prosecutors-to-produce-records","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/359275\/","title":{"rendered":"Judge in Comey case orders prosecutors to produce records"},"content":{"rendered":"

ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) \u2014 A federal judge on Wednesday ordered prosecutors in the criminal case of former FBI Director James Comey<\/a> to produce to defense lawyers a trove of materials from the investigation, saying he was concerned the Justice Department\u2019s position had been to \u201cindict first\u201d and investigate second.<\/p>\n

U.S. Magistrate Judge William Fitzpatrick instructed prosecutors to produce by the end of the day on Thursday grand jury materials and other evidence that investigators seized during the investigation. The order followed arguments in which Comey\u2019s attorneys said they were at a disadvantage because they had not been able to yet review information that was collected years ago as part of an investigation into FBI media leaks.<\/p>\n

Comey, who attended the hearing but did not speak, is charged with lying to Congress in 2020 in a case filed days after President Donald Trump appeared to urge his attorney general to prosecute the former FBI director and other perceived political enemies. Comey has pleaded not guilty<\/a>, and his lawyers have argued that it\u2019s a vindictive prosecution<\/a> brought at the direction of the Republican president and must be dismissed. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"Former<\/p>\n

Former FBI Director James Comey speaks to reporters on Capitol Hill Washington, Dec. 17, 2018. AP Photo\/J. Scott Applewhite, File)<\/p>\n

Former FBI Director James Comey speaks to reporters on Capitol Hill Washington, Dec. 17, 2018. AP Photo\/J. Scott Applewhite, File)<\/p>\n

Read More<\/p>\n

Fitzpatrick raised his own concerns, telling lawyers on Wednesday, \u201cThe procedural posture of this case is highly unusual.\u201d He said it appeared to him that the Justice Department had decided to \u201cindict first\u201d and investigate later.<\/p>\n

Comey\u2019s defense lawyers had already asked for a transcript of grand jury proceedings<\/a>, citing irregularities in the process and potential legal and factual errors that they said could result in the dismissal of the case.<\/p>\n

Fitzpatrick on Wednesday ordered prosecutors to produce grand jury materials and also directed them to give defense lawyers evidence seized through search warrants in 2019 and 2020 from Daniel Richman, a Columbia University law professor and close friend of Comey.<\/p>\n

Richman factors into the case because prosecutors say Comey had encouraged him to engage with reporters about matters related to the FBI and say Comey therefore lied to the Senate Judiciary Committee five years ago when he denied having authorized media leaks. Comey\u2019s lawyers deny that he made a false statement and say the question he responded to, from Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, was vague and confusing and appeared to be centered not on Richman but rather a different individual, former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe.<\/p>\n

Comey\u2019s lawyers told the judge they had not been shown by the government the materials taken from Richman, who had earlier served as a lawyer for Comey, and thus could not know what information was privileged and may have been improperly used as evidence.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re going to fix that, and we\u2019re going to fix that today,\u201d the judge said. <\/p>\n

Comey\u2019s indictment<\/a> came days after Trump in a social media post called on Attorney General Pam Bondi to take action against Comey and other longtime foes of the president. The indictment was brought by Lindsey Halligan<\/a>, a former White House aide and Trump lawyer who was installed as U.S. attorney after the longtime prosecutor who had been overseeing the investigation resigned under administration pressure to indict Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Justice Department in court papers earlier this week defended the president\u2019s social media post, contending it reflects \u201clegitimate prosecutorial motive\u201d and is no basis to dismiss the indictment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) \u2014 A federal judge on Wednesday ordered prosecutors in the criminal case of former FBI…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":359276,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[133370,3881,12785,84,69,57,51,4228,49023,12588,362,24980,133610,50,11335,80,4411,52,94,51507,906,93,174776],"class_list":{"0":"post-359275","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"tag-andrew-mccabe","9":"tag-ap-top-news","10":"tag-dc-wire","11":"tag-district-of-columbia","12":"tag-donald-trump","13":"tag-general-news","14":"tag-headlines","15":"tag-indictments","16":"tag-james-comey","17":"tag-juries","18":"tag-legal-proceedings","19":"tag-letitia-james","20":"tag-lindsey-halligan","21":"tag-news","22":"tag-pam-bondi","23":"tag-politics","24":"tag-ted-cruz","25":"tag-top-stories","26":"tag-u-s-department-of-justice","27":"tag-u-s-federal-bureau-of-investigation","28":"tag-virginia","29":"tag-washington-news","30":"tag-william-fitzpatrick"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115501514386651911","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/359275","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=359275"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/359275\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/359276"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=359275"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=359275"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=359275"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}