Michael Flynn Seeks to Withdraw Guilty Plea
“It is beyond ironic and completely outrageous that the prosecutors have persecuted Mr. Flynn, virtually bankrupted him, and put his entire family through unimaginable stress for three years”
General Michael Flynn is now accusing federal prosecutors of acting in “bad faith” during the Russia probe and is moving to withdraw his guilty plea. This is unfolding as he faces a term of six months in prison.
Trump supporters on Twitter have been calling on the president to pardon Flynn for months, and this development will likely increase those calls.
Andrew O’Reilly reports at FOX News:
Michael Flynn moves to withdraw guilty plea, citing ‘bad faith’ by government
Former national security adviser Michael Flynn moved Tuesday to withdraw his guilty plea for lying to the FBI in the Russia probe, citing “bad faith” by the government.
The court filing came just days after the Justice Department reversed course to recommend up to six months of prison time in his case, alleging he was not fully cooperating or accepting responsibility for his actions.
But, in Tuesday’s court filing, his legal team said he moved to withdraw his plea “because of the government’s bad faith, vindictiveness and breach of the plea agreement.”
“The prosecution has shown abject bad faith in pure retaliation against Mr. Flynn since he retained new counsel,” Flynn’s attorneys wrote in the filing. “This can only be because with new, unconflicted counsel, Mr. Flynn refused to lie for the prosecution.”
The filing continued:”Justice is not a game, and there should be no room for such gamesmanship in the Department of Justice.”
Is this a turning point in the Russian narrative that won’t seem to die?
Motion filed by @GenFlynn to withdraw guilty plea. https://t.co/XZmNHVfIGG
— Steve Herman (@W7VOA) January 15, 2020
We just filed a Motion to Withdraw the plea of @GenFlynn because the government acted in bad faith, with vindictiveness, and breached the plea agreement pursuant to which he has cooperated fully at great personal expense and “held back nothing” according to #prosecuters until pic.twitter.com/5FRWvvol09
— Sidney Powell ??⭐⭐⭐ (@SidneyPowell1) January 15, 2020
2. @GenFlynn refused to LIE on demand from #prosecutors in EDVA in Rafiekian case. Van Grack exploded–now his new sentencing memo seeks to send #Flynn to prison#BadFaith#breach@BarbaraRedgate @JosephJFlynn1 @flynn_neill @GoJackFlynn
#Flynn is innocent #FlynnWasSetUp pic.twitter.com/yiUrUIEOU8— Sidney Powell ??⭐⭐⭐ (@SidneyPowell1) January 15, 2020
Daniel Chaitin and Jerry Dunleavy of the Washington Examiner have more on this:
The motion, filed by Flynn’s legal team, which cites “the government’s bad faith, vindictiveness, and breach of the plea agreement,” comes one week after the Justice Department asked a federal judge to sentence President Trump’s former national security adviser to up to half a year in prison.
“It is beyond ironic and completely outrageous that the prosecutors have persecuted Mr. Flynn, virtually bankrupted him, and put his entire family through unimaginable stress for three years,” wrote former federal prosecutor Sidney Powell and her co-counsel wrote in a filing in the U.S. District Court in D.C.
Flynn, 61, pleaded guilty in 2017 for lying to investigators about his conversations with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak regarding U.S. sanctions and a U.N. Security Council vote. Former FBI Director James Comey admitted he took advantage of the chaos in the early days of the Trump administration when he sent then-special agent Peter Strzok and another FBI agent to talk to Flynn.
Curiously, Flynn is still fighting this battle as James Comey, Andrew McCabe, John Brennan, and James Clapper are free to go about their business.
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Comments
Us nobodies may have no direct path to untangle this, but we can send letters – paper not email, in support of Gen Flynn. Whatever infraction he may or may not have done is trivial compared to the gov’t hit job we’re now seeing bits and scraps of evidence about.
Anyone have some thoughts on to whom such letters should be addressed?
Mutlple copies to Federal, state and even your local county and town officials promising to vote down all Dems at all levels?
Already many DEM officials (some from the Obama criministration) pointing that possibility out.
Just yesterday one was say Bernie would as the Nom would destroy all changes of Dems winning anything – all the way down the ballot in November.
notamemberofanyorganizedpolicital
to vote down all Dems at all levels?
———————
Take a look at the bills Virginia democrats have up for their session regarding voting. They’re doing a California style set up to take away any chance of a fair election.
They’re also voting for winner take all in the fed elections. The end run around the electoral college favored by cheating dems all over the country.
If Flynn must stand before the Court, why not his predecessor lying Susan Rice?
Rice is black. Holder, Lynch, 0bama …. all black. The rules and standards are different for them. Don’t cha know?
Flynn is still fighting this because he made a huge mistake in pleading guilty in the first place. I’m sure he felt he had to, but it was a mistake, and he’s drawn a Judge who hates him.
and although he’s asked to withdraw his plea, the Judge doesn’t have to allow it. He may not. The only hope for Flynn is that after the impeachment fiasco is over, Trump should be free to pardon him.
“Black?”
SO they say.
you need to remember that Flynn was an associate of Pres Trump, they needed an inroad to him
I kind of wondered when this would happen. Didn’t everyone?
Odds on this happening?
I think Flynn thought it was going to be easier than this. Bongino said on Friday this was pay back for his Ukraine work that went against Soros. If you are following the big picture, Soros is behind all the Ukraine corruption. I bet that king Soros was buying Biden with the Brusmia job. That is why they are fighting so hard, it is all about the Soros corrupt enterprise that is being exposed.
For the life of me, I can not understand why Flynn used the original law firm. Was it part of the scam to get Trump to pardon him to add to the impeachment process for support obstruction?
Flynn has not been very smart about this from the start – I suppose he chose the original firm because they were “well connected” and were supposed to be able to fix things. My guess is that Flynn is a life long deep stater himself, who can’t quite grasp that suddenly all of his old team have turned on him and selected him for destruction.
Feel somewhat sorry for Flynn but he and sessions were supposedly old hands who knew how to fight outsmart Dems but turned out to be fools who make rookie mistakes. And both are pretty much root of DJT current probs.
The worst part to this is it IS a tangle. It shouldn’t be. Unfortunately, our gov’t – prosecutors, investigators, bureaucrats – has spent so much time working on an end, that they’ve corrupted the means, and we – the people – no longer trust them.
A republic can’t exist without a certain level of trust.
Based on Emmitt Sullivan’s Dec 2019 ruling, it is very unlikely Sullivan will be receptive to the withdrawal of the guilty plea and may not/probably not allow the withdrawal.
Sullivan was originally appointed to the Superior court of DC (the equivalant of state court in DC) by Reagan, the Bush 41 appointed Sullivan to the DC court of appeals (the court where the Mann v CEI/NR currently sits) and then to the federal district court in DC by Clinton.
I agree with you – I think Sullivan hates Flynn, and has already decided to give him jail time no matter what. A pardon is Flynn’s only hope now.
https://twitter.com/HansMahncke/status/1217304672219824128
As a counter to my prior comment, there is this twitter thread that may shed more light on the case
The Judge may surprise us. After all, he ruled that Flynn had no legal right to withdraw his guilty plea. The DOJ took that as a signal that they could unilaterally modify the agreement on their end. And, in so doing, the DOJ may have just created true legal grounds for withdrawing the plea.
If I was the Judge, I would be calling the DOJ lawyers into Chambers and setting them straight.
“If I was the Judge, I would be calling the DOJ lawyers into Chambers and setting them straight.”
Not sure the judge can do that – at least not without the other attorneys present – ex parte
I never understood why Powell didn’t do this from the start of her involvement. What would have been the downside? Thanks in advance.
After Judge Sullivan took over the case, he twice gave Flynn the opportunity to withdraw his guilty plea. It appears that Flynn and Powell decided to let everything ride on their motion for more discovery, which was rejected. I can’t believe that Sullivan will grant this motion, so late in the game.
Roger Rocket beat the rap but generally alleged white white collar criminals don’t do too well in dc courts.
Republicans don’t do well in DC Courts. Democrats Skate.
There need to be changes to the venue rules for federal prosecutions and lawsuits brought against federal politicians and federal employees. In order to provide for fair trials for federal employees whose politics might be out of favor with the 90% black democrat voters in DC, venue should be a choice by the defendant. The defendant should be able to chose venue in DC OR venue in the state of their legal/elected residence. This is just one of many things the GOP should have done, but failed to do during Trump’s first 2 years in office. Actually, they should have done it during the Bush years.
Pardons have bad optics. Which is why politically motivated pardons occur as a president is leaving office.
Mike LaChance’s comment that, “Curiously, Flynn is still fighting this battle as James Comey, Andrew McCabe, John Brennan, and James Clapper are free to go about their business” is spot on.
Knowing what we know — and I’ve read the FISA applications, all four of them — and knowing what we know about how Flynn was interviewed — I am baffled that people in government — the judges in all these cases, the prosecutors, the dem elected officials — all of them, except perhaps Trump and Durham — are so dedicated to their bureaucratic forgiveness of the coup plotters, and so dedicated to the personal destruction of those they dislike — they seem completely unaware of how this looks to the sane part of the rest of the country.
This looks sick, depraved, power-mad, vicious, dangerous, and completely unmoored from decent government. The rot produces such a loathsome stench that decent government is clearly dead and has been for some time.
This treatment of Flynn, as it continues to flagrantly abuse him, simply increases the stench.
Our government has grown too full of “civil servants” who think to run roughshod over our rights and do with total impunity.
Time to eliminate the civil service, time to kill it all off. It has turned into monsters.
Legal question to which I’m clueless: Is a plea agreement like a contract? I.e. does the obvious breaches of the agreement by the prosecution mean the agreement can be litigated for damages and such, while being withdrawn from by Flynn without penalty?
This case presents several catch 22’s common for the defendants in federal court
1) The sentences imposed for someone that pleads is vastly more lenient than for someone that pleads innocent and goes to trial in federal court.
2) The judge has wide discretion to prevent favorable evidence from getting into court. Judge Sullivan has already ruled against getting many documents into court in his Dec ruling.
3) Any appeals of Sullivan’s ruling goes through the DC CA which is heavily laden with Obama appointments. They certainly cant have any of Obama’s “non-scandals” see the light of day.
Unfortunately, Flynn cant win in this situation.
Powell’s strategy is most likely to set up a case for malicious prosecution and to show judicial bias on the Part of Sullivan, for an appeal. She knew that the DOJ could not release the requested documents as they would clearly show that the charges were unfounded and therefor the prosecution was malicious. And,, she knew, or strongly suspected, that Sullivan would not require the documents to be turned over to Powell. So, the court, having barred the defense from securing potential exculpatory evidence from the prosecution, Powell now asks for the guilty plea to be rescinded and set aside. Again, she believes that Sullivan will not allow that to happen, even though he seemingly offered that option to Flynn twice before. If he does not grant the motion to rescind the plea, then an appeal will be filed on the basis of judicial bias as well as malicious prosecution. Sullivan is the problem for the prosecution, in the long run. His public, in court comments have been scathingly negative, with regard to Flynn. He has made some small concessions to appear impartial, but these have amounted to nothing. He is clearly biased.
Not a bad strategy, considering the quagmire Powell inherited.
one major hurdle as I mentioned above – any appeal is to the DC CA which is currently heavily stocked with Obuma appointees.
Other than that issue, I agree with your analysis.
The appellate court is always a risk. But, the options of the AC are essentially limited to 1)ordering the plea be rescinded, 2)setting the conviction aside and returning the case to the lower court and ordering the requested potential Brady material be released to the defense or 3) upholding the lower court’s decision not to honor the motion to rescind the plea. This is a two to one shot for the defense. And, given the current actions of the lower court, choosing #3 can open the door to a SCOTUS appeal.
But, we’ll have to see what happens, as always.
Rusty Harden got Roger Rocket off. Powell should talk to him.
“Curiously, Flynn is still fighting this battle as James Comey, Andrew McCabe, John Brennan, and James Clapper are free to go about their business”
Not to mention John “The Traitor” Kerry and most of the rest of the Obama Crime Syndicate.