The "Russian election meddling" case has collapsed

POSTED BY: SIGNYM
UPDATED: Wednesday, March 18, 2020 13:40
VIEWED: 1626
PAGE 1 of 1

SIGNYM

Tuesday, March 17, 2020 1:29 PM

First, let me say I TOLD YOU SO. That whole "Russian meddling" narrative was baloney. They didn't provide Assange with the DNC emails, they didn't meddle with registration rolls, and the evidence that they tried to influence the election thru social media wa so thin anyone should have been able to see thru it. Even you. It was just a giant excuse to censor the internet and create a villain for their narrative. Now, they're dropping the case because the accused has chosen to fight them in court, demanding evidence instead of some cooked-up charges.

Quote:
Justice Dept. Moves to Drop Charges Against Russian Firms Filed by Mueller

The companies funded Russia’s social media-fueled interference in the 2016 election, prosecutors said. But they tried to weaponize the case instead of fight it.

By Katie Benner and Sharon LaFraniere

March 16, 2020

WASHINGTON — The Justice Department moved on Monday to drop charges against two Russian shell companies accused of financing schemes to interfere in the 2016 election, saying that they were exploiting the case to gain access to delicate information that Russia could weaponize.

The companies, Concord Management and Concord Consulting, were charged in 2018 in an indictment secured by the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, along with 13 Russians and another company, the Internet Research Agency. Prosecutors said they operated a sophisticated scheme to use social media to spread disinformation, exploit American social divisions and try to subvert the 2016 election.

Unlike the others under indictment, Concord fought the charges in court. But instead of trying to defend itself, Concord seized on the case to obtain confidential information from prosecutors, then mount a campaign of information warfare, a senior Justice Department official said.

Well, you can't try a defendant in court based on secret information that the accused can't access. It's called being able to face your accuser, and there is a whole process called "discovery" that allows the accused to see the information that the prosecutor has gathered. The "Justice" Department and the FBI did this to Flynn and other victims of prosecutorial misconduct, too.

Quote:
At one point, prosecutors complained that a cache of documents that could potentially be shared with the defendants included details about the government’s sources and methods for investigation, among its most important secrets. Prosecutors feared Concord might publish them online.

Oh dear! The accused might see the evidence aganst them???

I'm sorry, but ... who are the DOJ prosecutors in this case? Mickey and Minnie Mouse? Amyone with two neurons to rub together should have seen this coming. I know I did, and so did a lot of other people. The only reason why the DOJ wrote the accusations that they did is because they never figured that the accused would actually ... show up in court. So they cooked up all kinds of phony allegations and cited "confidential" information that they were certain would never be uncovered during trial. Wow, did they get caught with their pants down.

Quote:
With the case set to go to trial next month, prosecutors recommended that the Justice Department drop the charges to preserve national security interests and prevent Russia from weaponizing delicate American law enforcement information, according to the official. The prosecutors also weighed the benefits of securing a guilty verdict against the companies, which cannot be meaningfully punished in the United States, against the risk of exposing national security secrets in order to win in court.

“Concord has been eager and aggressive in using the judicial system to gather information about how the United States detects and prevents foreign election interference,” prosecutors said in a motion filed in court on Monday. At the same time, the firm has tried to stymie the judicial process, including by concealing facts and documents and submitting a false affidavit.[/quot

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CAPTAINCRUNCH

Tuesday, March 17, 2020 9:04 PM

You mean Bill Barr trying to sneak some sh*t past us while we're Covid-distracted.

You are so protective of The Russians!

AURAPTOR

Tuesday, March 17, 2020 9:54 PM

Cue Will Smith from I Robot.

“ Somehow ‘I told you so’ just doesn’t quite say it. “

THG

Tuesday, March 17, 2020 10:11 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by captaincrunch:

You mean Bill Barr trying to sneak some sh*t past us while we're Covid-distracted.

You are so protective of The Russians!

Right on both points G. That said, when the elections are over the check will be delivered.

tick tock

T

Deep state describes dedicated, educated professionals.

6IXSTRINGJACK

Tuesday, March 17, 2020 10:15 PM

lol

T's feeling mighty confident with COVID-19 backing him.

Here's a little tip, buddy. Don't drink it. It's not Kool-Aid.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

THG

Tuesday, March 17, 2020 10:56 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
lol

T's feeling mighty confident with COVID-19 backing him.

Here's a little tip, buddy. Don't drink it. It's not Kool-Aid.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

Molest any children lately Kev???

T

Deep state describes dedicated, educated professionals.

6IXSTRINGJACK

Tuesday, March 17, 2020 11:10 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by THG:
Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
lol

T's feeling mighty confident with COVID-19 backing him.

Here's a little tip, buddy. Don't drink it. It's not Kool-Aid.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

Molest any children lately Kev???

T

Deep state describes dedicated, educated professionals.

I think you've mistaken me with your choice for the future President. Or one of countless Hollywood Elite Liberals.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

SIGNYM

Wednesday, March 18, 2020 1:40 PM

Not only has the DOJ withdrawn its prosecution, Crowdstrike, the infamous Ukrainian-linked cybersecurity firm which "examined" the DNC servers, is ALSO retracting and rewriting its statements about Russia being at the root of the DNC server "hack".

Quote:
Cyber Firm Rewrites Part of Disputed Russian Hacking Report

WASHINGTON - U.S. cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike has revised and retracted statements it used to buttress claims of Russian hacking during last year's American presidential election campaign. The shift followed a VOA report that the company misrepresented data published by an influential British think tank.

In December, CrowdStrike said it found evidence that Russians hacked into a Ukrainian artillery app, contributing to heavy losses of howitzers in Ukraine's war with pro-Russian separatists.

VOA reported Tuesday that the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), which publishes an annual reference estimating the strength of world armed forces, disavowed the CrowdStrike report and said it had never been contacted by the company.

Ukraine's Ministry of Defense also has stated that the combat losses and hacking never happened.

Some see overblown allegations

CrowdStrike was first to link hacks of Democratic Party computers to Russian actors last year, but some cybersecurity experts have questioned its evidence. The company has come under fire from some Republicans who say charges of Kremlin meddling in the election are overblown.

After CrowdStrike released its Ukraine report, company co-founder Dmitri Alperovitch claimed it provided added evidence of Russian election interference. In both hacks, he said, the company found malware used by "Fancy Bear," a group with ties to Russian intelligence agencies.

CrowdStrike's claims of heavy Ukrainian artillery losses were widely circulated in U.S. media.

On Thursday, CrowdStrike walked back key parts of its Ukraine report. The company removed language that said Ukraine's artillery lost 80 percent of the Soviet-era D-30 howitzers, which used aiming software that purportedly was hacked. Instead, the revised report cites figures of 15 to 20 percent losses in combat operations, attributing the figures to IISS.

The original CrowdStrike report was dated Dec. 22, 2016, and the updated report was dated March 23, 2017.

And we're just reading about this now???

Quote:
Finally, CrowdStrike deleted a statement saying "deployment of this malware-infected application may have contributed to the high-loss nature of this platform" — meaning the howitzers — and excised a link sourcing its IISS data to a blogger in Russia-occupied Crimea.

In an email, CrowdStrike spokeswoman Ilina Dmitrova said the new estimates of Ukrainian artillery losses resulted from conversations with Henry Boyd, an IISS research associate for defense and military analysis. She declined to say what prompted the contact.

CrowdStrike defends report

"This update does not in any way impact the core premise of the report that the FANCY BEAR threat actor implanted malware into a D-30 targeting application developed by a Ukrainian military officer," Dmitrova wrote.

Reached by VOA, the IISS confirmed providing CrowdStrike with new information about combat losses, but declined to comment on CrowdStrike's hacking assertions.

"We don't think the current version of the [CrowdStrike] report draws conclusions with regard to our data, other than quoting the clarification we provided to them," IISS told VOA.

Dmitrova noted that the FBI and the U.S. intelligence community have also concluded that Russia was behind the hacks of the Democratic National Committee,

BECAUSE THE FBI NEVER EXAMINED THE SERVERS, NOR DID THEY EXAMINE CROWDSTRIKE'S REPORT. A report, btw, which was never finalized. Seriously? They expect us to swallow this circular garbage?
I would also like to add that the NSA ... the one agency that would h