Trump's James Comey prosecutor may 'have been serving illegally entire time': expert
The case against former FBI Director James Comey remains in serious jeopardy in the wake of Wednesday's shocking revelations that U.S. District Attorney Lindsey Halligan never actually presented the Department of Justice's final indictment against Comey to the full grand jury, according to former federal prosecutor Elise Adamson on "CNN This Morning."
The indictment was only presented to two jurors, including the grand jury foreperson and, CNN reports, it's a mistake that could end up getting the case thrown out entirely.
While the DOJ is defending Halligan in a new filing issued yesterday, Adamson says she's in trouble due to a two-hour time gap missing from the grand jury transcript that a judge demanded be turned over to Comey's team earlier this week.
"So they weren't even litigating this issue. They were actually litigating whether or not this is a selective or vindictive prosecution," Adamson explains. "But there was always this question about this missing time."
Adamson said that the grand jury voted initially on three charges, rejecting one, and approving two, but the transcripts posed a problem.
"The transcripts were odd because there was no indication that Lindsey Halligan ever went back to the grand jury to formalize those two approved charges," she says.
"So what came out yesterday is that Lindsey Halligan went back to her office and actually altered the document. She took out that third charge and then presented a new document to the court," she says.
"And the question as to whether it's normal? It is not normal," she adds. "Any experienced prosecutor knows that the document that is prepared and presented to the grand jury needs to be the same document that is then signed and filed, and that didn't happen."
Halligan, who was handpicked by President Donald Trump and the White House, has dubious experience other than being on Trump's personal legal team, and her resume is, at best, questionable Adamson says.
"I mean, she is an attorney, to be fair, she was a partner in an insurance law firm, but she has no prosecutorial experience," she explains. "And you need to have that experience, especially when you are presenting in the grand jury. What never happens is on your fourth day of work as a prosecutor, you go in to present a case to the grand jury."
Presenting to a grand jury isn't something for amateurs, Adamson explains.
"Even prosecutors with years of experience are supervised through that process because it is so complicated. It's a secret proceeding that is governed by a lot of process and procedures, and we see what happens. Ms. Halligan made a lot of what we can call rookie mistakes. Some are harmless, some potentially could be fatally flawed to the case," she says.
These mistakes may end up favoring Comey, Adamson explains, because he's been saying the case has been vindictive from the start.
"This is like a 'Choose Your Own Adventure' of procedural errors. In this case, this is one avenue for the defense to potentially get the indictment tossed out. Now, whether what we're talking about here, the changing of the indictment is a clerical error or a fatal flaw that's yet to be seen. This is unprecedented," she says.
"But there's all these other things that happen that could ultimately get the indictment tossed out. There is, of course, like the top thing, which is, is this vindictive and selective? That's a very high bar to meet. But here we have a Truth Social post from the president essentially directing this prosecution mere days before the statute of limitation," she adds.
Another thing Comey has tried to challenge was how Halligan got the job in the first place.
"That is still being actively litigated, because the interim appointment for the U.S. Attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia had already run, there's only 120 days that an interim can serve. And Eric Siebert had already served that 120 days after that time. The procedure state that the courts then put another attorney," she explains.
"It's legal error after legal error," Adamson says, clarifying that when the DOJ and the attorney general appoints an interim attorney, they can only serve in that post for 120 days.
Because someone had already served for 120 days, she says, "it's incumbent upon the courts to district courts of that jurisdiction to then install somebody until congress ultimately approves a replacement. That didn't happen here. Instead, the DOJ put Lindsey Halligan in— Donald Trump's personal attorney — so it's possible that she has been serving illegally this entire time."
Former Trump White House lawyer Ty Cobb told CNN's Erin Burnett that "the multiple constitutional violations that have, you know, came up are clearly intentional and clearly require sanctions of the most severe order. [Trump Attorney General Pam] Bondi of course, affirmed the alleged legitimacy of Halligan's grand jury presentation not once, but twice. In these proceedings and and that again is could not have been done honestly. So I do believe that each should be disbarred."
Adamson says that while Cobb used "very strong language," calling for Bondi's and Halligan's disbarrment, she did say "I think there, as we said, there's a whole host of issues. Some are more egregious than others. I don't think it would be surprising in the future to see someone like Lindsey Halligan facing ethics inquiry."