Trump confidant Roger Stone pleads not guilty

[CitizenBasehead]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-confidant-roger-stone-pleads-not-guilty/ar-BBSSols?ocid=spartanntp

Update: Donald Trump's longtime friend Roger Stone has pleaded not guilty to charges in the special counsel's Russia investigation. Stone is appearing for his arraignment at the federal courthouse in Washington after spending the weekend blasting special counsel Robert Mueller's case against him as politically motivated.
The self-proclaimed dirty trickster was arrested last week during a pre-dawn raid at his Florida home. He is charged in a seven-count indictment with obstruction, lying to Congress and witness tampering.

Prosecutors say he lied about the contents of his discussions with the Trump campaign involving WikiLeaks and hacked material damaging to Hillary Clinton that the anti-secrecy group released during the 2016 campaign. Stone is also accused of corruptly influencing the testimony of another witness.

Not really breaking news but most news nodays isn't even real news, It's fake news...

 

[NeverTrump]

Not really breaking news but most news nodays isn't even real news, It's fake news...

Translation: Stone is guilty and going to jail.

 

[Lutherf]

Translation: Stone is guilty and going to jail.

More along the lines of "Instead of just taking one on the chin because Mueller says I did stuff I'm going to avail myself of my Constitutional right to defend myself from these charges".

 

[Mach]

He wants a pardon or at least a commuted sentence like Scooter Libby.
Libby was up on like 5 counts, false statements and obstruction, and right wingers pushed hard for a pardon for him. Bush commuted his sentence.
What was Libby lying about? Protecting higher ups.

We really need to fix this pardon power so that it doesn't apply to people you're entangled with, and who apparently lie/obstruct specifically to help the person/group doing the pardoning. It's an abuse of power, and yet it's happened before, and will no doubt happen again.

 

[sangha]

More along the lines of "Instead of just taking one on the chin because Mueller says I did stuff I'm going to avail myself of my Constitutional right to defend myself from these charges".

Good luck to him

On the day he testified to Congress under oath that he did not have any text messages concerning Wikileaks, he had thirty text messages from Corsi.

 

[Mach]

More along the lines of "Instead of just taking one on the chin because Mueller says I did stuff I'm going to avail myself of my Constitutional right to defend myself from these charges".

Did you read the indictment? What makes you think he can beat that, and is not just hoping for a pardon? Why all the in public drama about "I will not testify against Trump", I have no negative information (whatever the **** that is), I will not bear false witness...etc. This isn't partisan, what really do you think he's doing?

 

[Praxas]

More along the lines of "Instead of just taking one on the chin because Mueller says I did stuff I'm going to avail myself of my Constitutional right to defend myself from these charges".

Just curious, why do you think he is not guilty knowing what we know about what he said to congress and facts that have come about since then?

 

[iguanaman]

More along the lines of "Instead of just taking one on the chin because Mueller says I did stuff I'm going to avail myself of my Constitutional right to defend myself from these charges".

I wish him good luck with that. He will need it. 99% of Fed indictments end in either guilty pleas or convictions. They don't indict unless they have the evidence to convict.

 

[Airyaman]

He wants a pardon or at least a commuted sentence like Scooter Libby.
Libby was up on like 5 counts, false statements and obstruction, and right wingers pushed hard for a pardon for him. Bush commuted his sentence.
What was Libby lying about? Protecting higher ups.

We really need to fix this pardon power so that it doesn't apply to people you're entangled with, and who apparently lie/obstruct specifically to help the person/group doing the pardoning. It's an abuse of power, and yet it's happened before, and will no doubt happen again.

If there was ever anyone charged so far that Trump would pardon, Stone would top the list. They've been friends for years.

 

[CitizenBasehead]

Translation: Stone is guilty and going to jail.

What is he guilty of? Is it going to have anything to do Trump?

Stone is a ****-slinger and he proudly admits doing it to combat democrat ****-slinging. The one thing no ones mentions is that he is also a Republican shill. He would be all this if it was for any other republican candidate.

Of all the indictments, this is the first case I'm actually interested in.

 

[Lutherf]

Good luck to him

On the day he testified to Congress under oath that he did not have any text messages concerning Wikileaks, he had thirty text messages from Corsi.

Did you read the indictment? What makes you think he can beat that, and is not just hoping for a pardon? Why all the in public drama about "I will not testify against Trump", I have no negative information (whatever the **** that is), I will not bear false witness...etc. This isn't partisan, what really do you think he's doing?

Just curious, why do you think he is not guilty knowing what we know about what he said to congress and facts that have come about since then?

I wish him good luck with that. He will need it. 99% of Fed indictments end in either guilty pleas or convictions. They don't indict unless they have the evidence to convict.

While I sincerely appreciate your concern over my response I would like to point out that choosing to defend himself isn't the same as being FOUND not guilty. That's kind of the same as the indictment, which is the prosecution's case for levying charges, isn't the same as being FOUND guilty.

Stone is merely telling the court that he'd like to exercise his right to defend himself. I would hope that's OK with all of you.

 

[sangha]

While I sincerely appreciate your concern over my response I would like to point out that choosing to defend himself isn't the same as being FOUND not guilty. That's kind of the same as the indictment, which is the prosecution's case for levying charges, isn't the same as being FOUND guilty.

Stone is merely telling the court that he'd like to exercise his right to defend himself. I would hope that's OK with all of you.

Which part of Good luck to him led you to believe his plea was not OK with me?

 

[iguanaman]

While I sincerely appreciate your concern over my response I would like to point out that choosing to defend himself isn't the same as being FOUND not guilty. That's kind of the same as the indictment, which is the prosecution's case for levying charges, isn't the same as being FOUND guilty.

Stone is merely telling the court that he'd like to exercise his right to defend himself. I would hope that's OK with all of you.

As I previously posted Stone has a 1% chance of being found not guilty. I guess he feels lucky.

 

[Cardinal]

Stone is a slow learner.

 

[Mach]

Stone is merely telling the court that he'd like to exercise his right to defend himself. I would hope that's OK with all of you.

We're talking about WHY, you're falling back to WHAT occurred.

Why can you not respond to direct questions?

Did you read the indictment? What makes you think he can beat that, and is not just hoping for a pardon? Why all the in public drama about "I will not testify against Trump", I have no negative information (whatever the **** that is), I will not bear false witness...etc. This isn't partisan, what really do you think he's doing?

 

[Mach]

Stone is a slow learner.

You don't think he'll be pardoned?

 

[Cardinal]

You don't think he'll be pardoned?

Is there something that's happened that makes it more likely he'll pardon Stone than anybody else?

 

[HumblePi]

Good luck to him

On the day he testified to Congress under oath that he did not have any text messages concerning Wikileaks, he had thirty text messages from Corsi.

The FBI has many of Roger Stone's emails and particularly many between he and Steve Bannon. I expect Bannon is the next to be indicted. Here's just one from Roger Stone to Steve Bannon. This particular smear campaign was in regards to whether or not Bill Clinton had an illegitimate bi-racial son with a prostitute in Arkansas. (where's my eye-roll emoji)

 

[Airyaman]

Is there something that's happened that makes it more likely he'll pardon Stone than anybody else?

He's not been friends with any of the others. Stone and Trump have been buddies for decades.

 

[Mach]

Is there something that's happened that makes it more likely he'll pardon Stone than anybody else?

- no one else appears to be so closely tied to an actually conspiracy (timing of the email release as part of the hacking/Russian criminal conspiracy)
- he was in contact with senior (and possibly higher) campaign officials about his dealings
- his charges are confined to his lying/obstruction specifically to protect the Trump campaign. Manafort, in contrast, had many serious crimes outside of his work for the campaign.
- he has very obviously been professing his innocence from the start, and jump in with the attacks on Mueller as all political, etc. Manafort didn't, nor did others that I'm aware of.
- he's known Trump for a long time, and apparently between him and Corsi, someone thinks someone should "take credit" for helping time the release around Access Hollywood, i.e. helping Trump get elected.

I don't know, just reminds me of scooter libby who lied/obstructed to protect his higher-ups. And if GWB could get that close to pardoning Scooter, and ultimately commuting his sentence, I have to imagine Trump has far less restraint. Just my guess.

 

[Lutherf]

As I previously posted Stone has a 1% chance of being found not guilty. I guess he feels lucky.

Every year I get a letter or two from the IRS saying that one of my clients lied on their tax return and failed to report $100k or more in stock sales. Quite often the IRS is right. I'll call my client and ask "Did you sell a bunch of stock and forget to tell me"? Sometimes they'll cop to the offense and say that they did but that they didn't know it needed to be reported. If I was a good prosecutor I'd haul them off to the IRS myself at that point, stand them in front of the RO and say "MY CLIENT IS GUILTY! Mete out whatever penalty the law allows!"

Of course I'm not a good prosecutor. I'm not a prosecutor at all. My job is to defend my client. That means I look for information that might get them out of the obvious hot water they are in. So, about 95% of the time I find information that tells me how much they bought the stock for. That's important information because tax can only be assessed on the gain from the sale of the stock. Sometimes there isn't any gain at all and, while the IRS is 100% right about them not reporting the sale, there still isn't any "crime" because there's no gain and they didn't really cause any damage by "lying" or "forgetting".

 

[Cardinal]

- no one else appears to be so closely tied to an actually conspiracy (timing of the email release as part of the hacking/Russian criminal conspiracy)
- he was in contact with senior (and possibly higher) campaign officials about his dealings
- his charges are confined to his lying/obstruction specifically to protect the Trump campaign. Manafort, in contrast, had many serious crimes outside of his work for the campaign.
- he has very obviously been professing his innocence from the start, and jump in with the attacks on Mueller as all political, etc. Manafort didn't, nor did others that I'm aware of.
- he's known Trump for a long time, and apparently between him and Corsi, someone thinks someone should "take credit" for helping time the release around Access Hollywood, i.e. helping Trump get elected.

I don't know, just reminds me of scooter libby who lied/obstructed to protect his higher-ups. And if GWB could get that close to pardoning Scooter, and ultimately commuting his sentence, I have to imagine Trump has far less restraint. Just my guess.

Touche.

 

[sangha]

Every year I get a letter or two from the IRS saying that one of my clients lied on their tax return and failed to report $100k or more in stock sales. Quite often the IRS is right. I'll call my client and ask "Did you sell a bunch of stock and forget to tell me"? Sometimes they'll cop to the offense and say that they did but that they didn't know it needed to be reported. If I was a good prosecutor I'd haul them off to the IRS myself at that point, stand them in front of the RO and say "MY CLIENT IS GUILTY! Mete out whatever penalty the law allows!"

Of course I'm not a good prosecutor. I'm not a prosecutor at all. My job is to defend my client. That means I look for information that might get them out of the obvious hot water they are in. So, about 95% of the time I find information that tells me how much they bought the stock for. That's important information because tax can only be assessed on the gain from the sale of the stock. Sometimes there isn't any gain at all and, while the IRS is 100% right about them not reporting the sale, there still isn't any "crime" because there's no gain and they didn't really cause any damage by "lying" or "forgetting".

I am not sure how your story is relevant

Are you saying the expense of the 30 text messages Stone received on the day he testified he had none means he is innocent of lying because he had no gain?

 

[Lutherf]

I am not sure how your story is relevant

Are you saying the expense of the 30 text messages Stone received on the day he testified he had none means he is innocent of lying because he had no gain?

I'm saying that the indictment is only part of the story. I'm saying that the indictment can be 100% accurate as to the included details but could also be missing 100% of any exculpatory evidence.

 

[Athanasius68]

- no one else appears to be so closely tied to an actually conspiracy (timing of the email release as part of the hacking/Russian criminal conspiracy)
- he was in contact with senior (and possibly higher) campaign officials about his dealings
- his charges are confined to his lying/obstruction specifically to protect the Trump campaign. Manafort, in contrast, had many serious crimes outside of his work for the campaign.
- he has very obviously been professing his innocence from the start, and jump in with the attacks on Mueller as all political, etc. Manafort didn't, nor did others that I'm aware of.
- he's known Trump for a long time, and apparently between him and Corsi, someone thinks someone should "take credit" for helping time the release around Access Hollywood, i.e. helping Trump get elected.

I don't know, just reminds me of scooter libby who lied/obstructed to protect his higher-ups. And if GWB could get that close to pardoning Scooter, and ultimately commuting his sentence, I have to imagine Trump has far less restraint. Just my guess.

However:
1. The indictment of Stone says that he told somebody in the Trump campaign about "potential" future releases. Mueller is not alleging that Stone and Wikileaks conspired.

2. The lying charges again are process crimes, unrelated to the substance of the matter ie collusion.

3. Maybe Stone is professing his innocence of the charges because he is innocent.

4. Not sure what means. As per the indictment, Stone had no knowledge of future releases.

Everyone is supposedly waiting on a pardon. But that doesn't matter for what Mueller chooses to indict. And his indictments continue to show there was no collusion, no conspiracy to throw the election.