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Roger Stone Is Sentenced to Over 3 Years in Prison Roger Stone Is Sentenced to Over 3 Years in Prison
(about 4 hours later)
WASHINGTON — Roger J. Stone Jr., a longtime friend of President Trump’s, was sentenced Thursday to more than three years in prison for obstructing a congressional inquiry in a bid to protect the president. WASHINGTON — Roger J. Stone Jr., a longtime friend and adviser of President Trump, was sentenced Thursday to more than three years in prison in a politically fraught case that put the president at odds with his attorney general, stirred widespread consternation in the Justice Department and provoked the judge in the case to denounce pressure on the justice system.
The case against Mr. Stone, 67, who has known and advised Mr. Trump for years, had become a cause célèbre among the president’s supporters. Mr. Trump has attacked the prosecutors, the jury forewoman and the federal judge overseeing the trial, casting his former campaign adviser as the victim of a vendetta by law enforcement. In announcing the 40-month sentence, Judge Amy Berman Jackson of United States District Court in Washington suggested that attacks on federal judges, prosecutors and juries should be a wake-up call that such behavior should not be normal for political leaders. While she never mentioned Mr. Trump by name, her remarks seemed directed at him.
Hours after the sentencing, Mr. Trump lashed out again at the authorities for prosecuting Mr. Stone and claimed his trial was unfair, but he said he would not intervene using his clemency powers at this point. “The dismay and the disgust at the attempts by others to defend his actions as just business as usual in our polarized climate should transcend party,” the judge said of Mr. Stone. “The dismay and disgust at any attempt to interfere with the efforts of prosecutors and members of the judiciary to fulfill their duty should transcend party.”
“I’m not going to do anything in terms of the great powers bestowed on a president of the United States,” he said at an event in Las Vegas for former convicts easing back into society. “I want the process to play out. I think that’s the best thing to do because I’d love to see Roger exonerated — and I’d love to see it happen — because personally I think he was treated unfairly.” The prosecution was thrown into disarray last week when Attorney General William P. Barr overruled a sentencing recommendation by four career prosecutors, who then quit the case in protest. Mr. Barr said he decided on his own that the prosecutors’ request for a prison term of seven to nine years was too harsh. But his move coincided with Mr. Trump’s public complaints about the prosecutors’ recommendation and elicited widespread criticism that he had bent to the president’s will.
Instead, he said he would wait to see how the case is ultimately resolved, leaving a clear impression that he would issue a pardon or commutation if he were unsatisfied. “We will watch the process and watch it very closely,” Mr. Trump said. “And at some point, I will make a determination. But Roger Stone and everybody has to be treated fairly. And this has not been a fair process. OK?” The attorney general, facing a virtual revolt by some in the department, asked Mr. Trump in a nationally televised interview to cease his running commentary about the department’s criminal cases.
Mr. Stone was convicted of lying to congressional investigators and trying to block the testimony of a witness who would have exposed his lies to the House Intelligence Committee. At the time, the panel was investigating whether Mr. Trump’s campaign conspired with the Russian government to influence the 2016 presidential election. Yet less than three hours after Mr. Stone was sentenced, the president declared he should be “exonerated,” echoing the defense team’s arguments in detail. Speaking in Las Vegas, he said Mr. Stone was the victim of “a bad jury” led by an anti-Trump activist And he suggested that he would use his clemency power to spare Mr. Stone if Judge Jackson did not agree to a new trial sought by defense lawyers.
His sentencing played out amid extraordinary upheaval at the Justice Department set off by Attorney General William P. Barr overruling prosecutors on the case who had asked for a seven- to nine-year sentence. Mr. Barr said that was too harsh. A jury in November convicted Mr. Stone of seven felony charges, including lying under oath to a congressional committee and threatening a witness whose testimony would have exposed those lies. In biting tones, Judge Jackson dismissed any notion that the case lacked merit.
Judge Amy Berman Jackson excoriated Mr. Stone, saying his efforts to thwart a legitimate congressional inquiry of national importance were “a threat to our most fundamental institutions, to the very foundation of our democracy.” But she stopped well short of the original prosecutors’ recommendation and handed down a sentence of 40 months in prison. She said that Mr. Stone hindered a congressional inquiry of national importance because the truth would have embarrassed the president and his 2016 campaign. The documentary evidence alone, she said, proved that Mr. Stone deceived the House Intelligence Committee about his efforts to obtain information from WikiLeaks about Democratic emails that had been stolen by Russian operatives who sought to influence the 2016 presidential election.
Without mentioning Mr. Trump or any of his allies by name, Judge Jackson seemed to point to their conduct, too. “The dismay and the disgust at the attempts by others to defend his actions as just business as usual in our polarized climate should transcend party,” she said. “He was not prosecuted, as some have complained, for standing up for the president. He was prosecuted for covering up for the president,” the judge said. In government inquiries, she added, “the truth still exists. The truth still matters.” Otherwise, she said, “everyone loses.”
Mr. Stone is among a half-dozen former Trump aides to be convicted — many on charges of lying to investigators or obstructing inquiries — in cases stemming from the investigation by the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, into Russia’s election interference. Most already served their sentences or are in prison. Judge Jackson took special umbrage at the defense team’s argument that Mr. Stone’s deception was of no real consequence. “Sure, defense is free to say, ‘Who cares?’” she said. “But I will say this: Congress cared.” So, too, she said, did the Justice Department and U.S. attorney’s office, which brought the case, and the jurors who heard the evidence.
Mr. Stone’s lawyers were expected to appeal. “The American people cared. And I care,” she declared.
The case also prompted a virtual standoff between the president and Mr. Barr over Mr. Trump’s comments about it. The president has criticized the jury’s verdict, claiming that “the real crimes were on the other side.” He intensified those attacks after the prosecutors recommended that Mr. Stone be sentenced to up to nine years in prison, in accordance with advisory sentencing guidelines. Their request, Mr. Trump said, was “horrible and very unfair” and constituted a “miscarriage of justice.” In his remarks in Las Vegas, Mr. Trump made clear he was not satisfied with the outcome of the case.
Almost simultaneously, Mr. Barr overruled the prosecutors’ sentencing recommendation and a new one was filed in court. It recommended a more lenient sentence but left the specific length of a prison term up to the judge. The reversal, more aligned with Mr. Trump’s preference, led all four prosecutors to withdraw from the case. One resigned from the Justice Department entirely. “I’m not going to do anything in terms of the great powers bestowed on a president of the United States,” he said. “I want the process to play out. I think that’s the best thing to do because I’d love to see Roger exonerated — and I’d love to see it happen — because personally I think he was treated unfairly. ”
John Crabb Jr., a prosecutor in the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington, apologized during the sentencing hearing for “the confusion” over the government’s sentencing position and stressed that the prosecutors who quit from the case were not to blame. He said he would wait to see how the case was ultimately resolved.
He said that department policy is to follow the sentencing guidelines in recommending punishment, and those prosecutors did so. He also said the department continued to believe that aggravating factors in the case had boosted the penalty recommended under the guidelines for Mr. Stone fivefold. “The Department of Justice and the United States attorney’s office is committed to enforcing the law without fear, favor or political influence,” he said. “We will watch the process and watch it very closely,” the president added. “And at some point, I will make a determination. But Roger Stone and everybody has to be treated fairly. And this has not been a fair process, OK?”
He said Mr. Stone’s offenses were serious and worthy of a “substantial period of incarceration,” but left it up to the judge to decide the right punishment. He blamed the competing sentencing memorandums on “miscommunication” between Timothy Shea, the interim United States attorney, and his superiors at Justice Department headquarters. Judge Jackson, who spent six years in the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington that handled the case, interrogated the prosecutor who replaced the four who quit over the change in sentencing recommendation ordered by Mr. Barr. In a second sentencing recommendation, prosecutors said “far less” of a prison term than seven to nine years was warranted, but left the length of incarceration up to the judge.
Judge Jackson questioned him closely about the process, asking whether he wrote the second sentencing memorandum or simply signed it. And she asked him point-blank about the last-minute switch in the prosecution team. “Is there anything you would like to say about why you are standing there today?” she demanded. Why, she asked, had the prosecutors scrapped Justice Department policy — as well as the usual practice of the office — and sought a more lenient punishment than advisory sentencing guidelines suggested?
Mr. Crabb deflected some of her questions, saying, “I apologize I cannot engage in discussions of internal deliberations.” “As I understand it, you are representing the United States of America,” she told John Crabb, Jr., an assistant United States attorney, with a trace of sarcasm. “I fear you know less about the case, saw less of the testimony and exhibits than just about every other person in this courtroom.”
The case ignited a broader controversy as former and current government lawyers accused Mr. Barr of failing to protect the department from improper political influence from the White House. In an open letter, more than 2,000 former Justice Department employees have called for Mr. Barr to resign, claiming “interference in the fair administration of justice” by both the attorney general and the president. “Is there anything you would like to say about why you are the one standing here?” she asked.
In a television interview last Thursday, Mr. Barr said he had decided to recommend a more lenient punishment for Mr. Stone based on the merits of the case. He also asked the president to stop publicly opining about the department’s criminal cases, saying it was making his job “impossible.” Clearly uncomfortable, Mr. Crabb apologized to the judge for “the confusion the government has caused.” He went out of his way to compliment her, saying the Justice Department trusted her to decide justly because of her expertise in such cases and “this court’s record of thoughtful analysis and fair sentences.”
But Mr. Trump has continued his commentary, putting him at loggerheads with Mr. Barr in a drama that has gripped Washington and seems to have no clear resolution. Mr. Crabb defended the prosecution as a“righteous” effort to hold Mr. Stone to account for “serious” crimes. And he said the prosecutors who resigned from the case were not to blame for the confusion, instead blaming “a miscommunication” between Mr. Barr and Timothy Shea, the newly appointed United States attorney for the District of Columbia.
After the hearing began, Mr. Trump again criticized the case as unfair, accusing two former F.B.I. officials, the former director James B. Comey and a former deputy director, Andrew G. McCabe, of crimes that have not been charged or prosecuted. “The Department of Justice and the United States attorney’s office is committed to enforcing the law without fear, favor or political influence,” he said.
In a last-ditch effort to delay the sentencing, Mr. Stone’s lawyers moved for a new trial on the basis of juror misconduct — a claim that Mr. Trump highlighted in one of his tweets. But Mr. Crabb raised yet more questions by simultaneously defending the argument for a stiff sentence laid out in the office’s first sentencing memo without disavowing the second sentencing memo that argued for a lighter punishment.
Judge Jackson said she would review the motion and the government’s response and would schedule a hearing if necessary. But she refused to put off Mr. Stone’s sentencing while those efforts were underway. “I’m not at liberty to discuss internal deliberations,” he said when the judge pressed him for details. “I apologize.”
At the sentencing, Judge Jackson took special umbrage at the defense team’s argument to the jury that Mr. Stone’s lies did not matter. “The truth still exists. The truth still matters” in official government proceedings, she said. Otherwise, she said, “everyone loses.” Judge Jackson said she agreed with the Justice Department’s second memo that the sentencing guidelines were too harsh, said she wondered if the government would adopt that same stance in future cases or whether it was reserved only for Mr. Stone.
In their initial sentencing memorandum, federal prosecutors said that Mr. Stone deserved a stiff sentence because he threatened a witness with bodily harm, deceived congressional investigators and carried out an extensive, deliberate, illegal scheme that included repeatedly lying under oath and forging documents. The Stone case was one of the last prosecutions arising from the investigation by the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential race. Despite the controversy surrounding it, Judge Jackson said repeatedly on Thursday that she was treating the case like any ordinary prosecution.
Even after he was charged in a felony indictment, the prosecutors said, Mr. Stone continued to try to manipulate the administration of justice by threatening Judge Jackson in a social media post and violating her gag orders. Those and other factors justified a stiff sentence under advisory federal guidelines, they said. She said she also took into account that Mr. Stone is 67 and had no criminal record. Working against Mr. Stone, she said, was his “belligerence” and “incendiary” conduct after he was indicted. On social media, Mr. Stone posted a photo of the judge with the image of a cross-hairs near her head.
The witness, a New York radio host named Randy Credico, ultimately invoked his Fifth Amendment rights rather than testify before the House Intelligence Committee, although he later was interviewed by the F.B.I. and appeared before a federal grand jury. In response, Judge Jackson imposed a strict gag order on Mr. Stone, but she said he violated it even during trial when he appeared to ask the president, through a proxy, for a pardon, she said. Flouting court orders and threatening the security of court personnel “is intolerable to the administration of justice,” she declared.
In a letter submitted to the judge on Mr. Stone’s behalf, Mr. Credico undercut the prosecutors’ argument, saying he never feared that Mr. Stone himself would harm him. But during the trial, he testified that he feared that Mr. Stone, a well-known political commentator, could create havoc in his life if he did not bend to his wishes, and prosecutors said he feared that Mr. Stone could stir others to violence. Much of the debate over Mr. Stone’s sentence revolved around whether he merely tried to influence a witness not to cooperate or issued a threat of violence, which under the sentencing guidelines would prompt a far more substantial penalty.
In their second sentencing memo, prosecutors said, “Ultimately, the government defers to the court as to what specific sentence is appropriate under the facts and circumstances of this case.” Initially, the prosecutors asserted that Mr. Stone’s threat of bodily harm justified a stiffer sentence. So, too, did the fact that he prevented congressional investigators from discovering the truth and carried out an extensive scheme over many months to frustrate them, they said.
Then they appeared to back off, noting that the witness, a New York radio host named Randy Credico, had written a letter to the judge saying he never feared that Mr. Stone himself would actually harm him.
Seth Ginsberg, Mr. Stone’s defense lawyer, said that Mr. Stone was simply engaging in his usual banter. “Mr. Stone is know for using rough, hyperbolic language,” he said. “There was no threat at all.”
Judge Jackson said Mr. Credico was an “extremely nervous” witness whose accounts had varied over time. She noted that he had testified to a grand jury that he had left his home and was wearing a disguise because he feared he would be in danger if Mr. Stone identified him as “a rat.”
During the trial, Mr. Credico said that he feared Mr. Stone, a well-known political commentator, would create havoc in his life and that of a close friend’s if he testified before the House committee. He ultimately took the Fifth Amendment.
The judge said she could not simply overlook Mr. Stone’s texts to Mr. Credico, including one that read, “Prepare to die.”
While Mr. Stone clearly enjoyed “adolescent mind games,” she said, “nothing about this case was a joke. It wasn’t a stunt and it wasn’t a prank.”
Zach Montague contributed reporting.Zach Montague contributed reporting.