Roger Stone was indicted and arrested in a raid on his home this morning.
There’s very little that we didn’t already know, at least in outline form: he was indicted because he lied to HPSCI about Jerome Corsi being his source for early WikiLeaks information rather than Randy Credico and then pressured Credico to sustain that claim for him. The sexiest detail about that is that he told Credico he should do a Frank Pentangeli, meaning he should claim not to know what he did.
On multiple occasions, including on or about December 1, 2017, STONE told Person 2 that Person 2 should do a “Frank Pentangeli” before HPSCI in order to avoid contradicting STONE’s testimony. Frank Pentangeli is a character in the film The Godfather: Part II, which both STONE and Person 2 had discussed, who testifies before a congressional committee and in that testimony claims not to know critical information that he does in fact know.
The most important detail — by far — in the indictment reveals that a senior Trump Campaign official “was directed” to contact Stone about what else was coming from WikiLeaks.
After the July 22, 2016 release of stolen DNC emails by Organization 1, a senior Trump Campaign official was directed to contact STONE about any additional releases and what other damaging information Organization 1 had regarding the Clinton Campaign. STONE thereafter told the Trump Campaign about potential future releases of damaging material by Organization 1.
I suspect that the senior Trump Campaign official was Rick Gates, though that’s a guess (Bannon is the very senior official named later in the indictment). The indictment doesn’t say, “directed by whom.”
And that, I think, is why Stone was arrested before dawn rather than permitted to self report, and why Stone was charged with obstruction plus five counts of false statements plus witness tampering (the latter of which carries real time, particularly given Stone’s physical threats to Credico’s dog Bianca).
This is an effort to get Stone to reveal who that “whom” was, and whatever follow-up contacts he had with that “whom.”
The indictment also doesn’t charge Jerome Corsi, nor does it describe Stone asking Corsi to write a cover story for him back in August 2016. That may mean that Mueller now wants Stone to incriminate Corsi.
The indictment comes before Mueller obtains Andrew Miller’s testimony, which Miller himself has suggested might include interesting information about campaign finance.
But for now, this looks like an indictment and a delivery of it designed to strong arm Stone. I’m not sure that’s going to work with Stone.
Update: Two other key details.
First, the Big Dick Toilet Salesman let Bobby Three Sticks arrest Roger Stone. That’s got to make Trump … uncomfortable about his cover-up plans.
Also, remember that Paul Manafort is due in court today, to find out whether he’ll do life for lying while he was supposed to be cooperating. If Manafort lied to protect Stone (and that’s an area of his cooperation about which Mueller was curiously silent), this may get his attention.
As I disclosed last July, I provided information to the FBI on issues related to the Mueller investigation, so I’m going to include disclosure statements on Mueller investigation posts from here on out. I will include the disclosure whether or not the stuff I shared with the FBI pertains to the subject of the post.