I’ve been trying to figure out a non-political motive for federal prosecutors to arrange with Bahamian authorities to arrest Democrat Mega-Donor and Crypto King Sam Bankman-Fried the day before he was to testify to Congress.
When this first happened, I could think of no good reason, But Why? Democrat Mega-Donor Crypto King Sam Bankman-Fried Arrested In Bahamas Preventing His Congressional Testimony:
Funny that. It goes against everything you would expect prosecutors to do. Why not let him testify under oath. It’s no lose for the feds. “Anything you say can and will be used against you.”There was no downside. Dem Crypto King may have further implicated himself in criminal conduct. Or he may have lied under oath to Congress, more potential federal charges. His testimony could not help him or hurt the prosecution because even if he did well, you can’t introduce your own prior statements as evidence.And there was no downside to the feds even if they already had a mountain of evidence against him. Too much evidence of guilt is a prosecutor’s dream. Usually.So no downside for the feds, no upside for Dem Crypto King, if he testified….The only potential downside to Dem Crypto King testifying before Congress today was for Democrats if Republicans got to question him about his political donations and ties to Democrats.
I still can think of no good reason to act so precipitously, unless he was about to flee or kill himself or something that would have prevented arrest. But none of that has been offered as a reason.
Which brings me to a video I posted in 2017, about how team Mueller was pursuing mostly process crimes as part of the Russia collusion investigation. The point was that there is no upside from talking to the FBI, and plenty of downside:
Why is anyone voluntarily speaking with the FBI or Mueller’s team about anything related to the investigation? It’s a field of landmines, where even someone trying to be honest could make errors that are indictable as obstructing justice. Memories just aren’t that good, and nothing is going to be forgiven when it comes to Trump.Which also reminded me of this video I first saw a few months ago on why even completely innocent people should not talk to the police. The video apparently is something of a classic, but I had never seen it until a few months ago.I was going to write about it them, but it fell by the wayside. I was reminded of it again by Jeff B on Twitter.The best thing for me about the video is when I was watching it for the first time, a few minutes in I realized, hey that’s Jim Duane, my law school classmate! He was a very good guy and very smart, and he has some smart advice. But it’s easier said than done to not talk to the cops — we want to be helpful, we want to trust good intentions, and we want to prove our innocence.Which is probably why a lot of people are talking to the feds about Trump. Which means there are going to be a lot more unintentional process crime indictments.
Here’s the video. The reasons why general citizens should not talk to the police are the flip side of why the feds should have wanted to have Dem Crypto King testify to congress. There was zero upside for Dem Crypto King, and only upside for the feds.
Baffling.
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