David Weiss Is Withholding the Proof Leo Wise Claims Doesn’t Exist
Leo Wise continues to engage in a kind of arbitrage to win his argument that politics didn’t lead David Weiss to renege on Hunter Biden’s plea agreement, making claims that may be true for him and Derek Hines, but are patently false for David Weiss, the only prosecutor still on the team who was involved in the plea deal itself.
According to the Daily Mail, Wise insisted in the hearing the Hunter Biden prosecution last week that there’s no proof the claims of disgruntled IRS agents Joseph Ziegler and Gary Shapley affected the case.
‘These two agents started the dominos,’ Lowell said. ‘When was the last time a chair of a congressional committee sought intervention to stop a plea deal?’
Wise hit back that the claim he was influenced by former IRS agents was ‘patently absurd’, adding ‘I couldn’t pick them out of a lineup’.
‘The defense’s problem is… they offer no proof,’ Wise said. ‘Other than insulting us, where is the proof?’
The proof exists in official testimony that DOJ witnessed and surely has in its possession.
On September 7 of last year — just days before the first indictment — Special Agent in Charge Thomas Sobocinski (who also remained on the case before and after the reneged plea deal) described that after Gary Shapley went public in late May, he and David Weiss spoke about how Shapley’s comments would affect the case.
The way it affected the case, Sobocinski explained, was that family members of investigative team members were getting stalked.
Q After it became public that Gary Shapley was going to come to Congress and he gave, I think, an interview on CBS in the at the end of May before his congressional testimony, who did you discuss that with?
A My team within Baltimore, probably folks within the Criminal Investigative Division. Definitely David Weiss.
Q And what was the nature of your conversation with David Weiss?
A I need to go off the record for a minute.
Mr. [Steve] Castor. Okay.
[Discussion held off the record.]
Mr. Sobocinski. Yeah. In general, it was concerns about how this was going to affect the ongoing case and were there issues we needed to take into at least from the FBI side to move forward.
BY MR. CASTOR:
Q After Shapley’s testimony became public in June, did you have any conversations with David Weiss about that?
A We acknowledged it, but it wasn’t I mean, we didn’t sit there with the transcript going back and forth. We both acknowledged that it was there and that it would have had it had an impact on our case.
Q Okay. Did any of your conversations with David Weiss, you know, have anything to do with like, can you believe what Shapley’s saying, this is totally 100 percent untrue?
A I don’t remember that level of it.
Q If it was
A I was more concerned about how this is affecting my employees. I now have FBI employees that names are out there. I have FBI employees and former FBI retired agents who’ve served for 20plus years whose parents are getting phone calls, whose photos with their girlfriends, who their children who are being followed. That is not something that we were prepared for, and I was concerned about having that continue or expand to other one of my employees. [my emphasis]
Obviously, both Sobocinski and David Weiss (who attended the hearing) know about the discussions they themselves had about how Shapley’s media tour led family members of the investigative team to be stalked. FBI’s Assistant General Counsel Megan Greer and DOJ’s Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Legal Affairs Sara Zdeb attended the deposition as well and so know of this testimony. It is my understanding that DOJ has reviewed these transcripts for accuracy, and so must have copies of them.
The proof is there, almost certainly in DOJ custody. It’s just that David Weiss is withholding it from Hunter Biden.
I will cycle back to this issue once a transcript becomes available. I’ve seen no mention of the uncontested assertion by Abbe Lowell that David Weiss came to fear for the safety of his family. Judge Mark Scarsi reportedly asserted that the only evidence Lowell presesnted is stuff on the Internet — but of course, there’s a DC Circuit opinion that found that Trump’s threats “have real-world consequences.”
It’s not enough for Leo Wise to claim that Shapley’s actions had no impact on his own behavior. He needs to address whether it had an impact on Weiss’ actions.
And according to the FBI supervisor overseeing this case, Shapley’s actions “had an impact on our case,” because they led everyone to start worrying about the safety of their families.
Leo Wise may claim that because it wasn’t his family being stalked, the media tour didn’t have an impact on his decisions. But he would never have been added to the team if not for the campaign by the disgruntled IRS agents.
I don’t closely watch RW networks, but I’d be shocked if there wasn’t some clip out there of Comer or Jordan bragging about how their work is what killed “the sweetheart plea deal”. It was the prevailing narrative right after the hearing when the deal tanked. I seem to recall Fox News taking victory laps for days.
Here’s a clip from Comer interview on Newsmax back in August
https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1691953538576879710
“Shoving that sweetheart plea deal up the rear ends of the Department of Justice.”
Great find, zscore.
Thanks for that, zscore!
https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1691953538576879710
7:22 PM · Aug 16, 2023
Transcript:
Has Lowell suboenaed these transcripts and Weiss is withholding them, or is it that Weiss hasn’t voluntarily offered them up in a general production of relevant materials?
Excellent question.
I’m not a fan of SC David Weiss, nor Judge Noreika; therefore, I wait patiently to see their next respective moves in this fiasco of a case.
Meh, Noreika, while a Trump appointee, is fine and well qualified. This is on Weiss and DOJ.
It’s my daily annoying IANAL question but it seems to me that hiding exculpatory material like this (I don’t know if it’s Brady or Jencks or something else) as SC Weiss has been busted for is grounds for outright dismissal for prosecutorial misconduct. If the defense team had requested these in discovery (and I think Lowell has based on the unchallenged claim EW cited from Lowell’s filing) then I would expect to see the MTD to follow. This is not even close to the first time that SC Weiss has gaslighted (being charitable here) the court about the evidence.
Where my daily question would be even more annoying is at what point is criminality established by Weiss’ conduct here? I noted before as a wild-arse opinion that while incompetence can’t really be punished in government service, criminality can and EW has documented a series of deliberate lies / obfuscations / misrepresentations / goddamn lies, etc. that Weiss has made in statements and filings under penalty of perjury. These statements, etc. would also I suspect be considered as lying to federal investigators which is what sent Martha Stewart to Club Fed. Advocacy is one thing, but this has gone well past that into Kari Lake territory.
Marcy,
They have no proof. Just insults. But wait, wait for it, “The way it affected the case, Sobocinski explained, was that family members of investigative team members were getting stalked.”
Special Agent in Charge Sobocinski’s testimony is proof. Intimidations of executive governmental agencies employees occur when those employee’s family members are stalked and the awareness of stalking of family members directly impacts behaviors/decisions made by prosecution team members. Or maybe everyone on the prosecution’s team is “On the Spectrum” and has no conscious perception of personal risk when facing imminent dangerous stalking threats. Which is more insulting?
Just trying to parse this phrasing:
“that it was there (Shapley’s testimony) and that it would have (would have what?) had it had (if it had had) an impact on our case”
Am I correct in inferring that he is saying the testimony per se did not impact the case but could have? Or that at that time referenced it had not yet had an impact? (i.e. the testimony itself as opposed to threats against FBI employees–I would expect that such threats from the public should impact steps the FBI takes to safeguard its employees and their families but should not affect the specific investigation or conclusions, right?)
Not trying to sealion here, just that the grammatical structure of written and spoken statements seems to be important on this site.
I read that as: “it would have had – it had an impact”. Mentally switching gears from “it would have had an impact” to the more forceful “it had an impact”.
This is where the written word is not as clear as to what a persons intent is. When you hear it you hear the inflection, the tone, the pauses and of course if live you have body language. Here’s the way I read it as it was awkward as printed:
“We both acknowledged that it was there and that it would have had…. it had an impact on our case.” (ellipses indicate a pause as he rephrases his response.)
In other words the audio of the response would make clear if he meant “that it had an impact on our case”. That to me makes more sense than his stating that it did not have an impact after acknowledging he had discussions with Weiss about it having an impact on the case. It only stands to reason that they would be interested in the testimony of someone who is involved in the case. I also cannot believe that prosecutors would not pay attention to the social and political noise around such a high profile case especially in the time of Trump with not just his constant bombast but the bombast of politicians like Comer whose outrageous comment is noted above.
What is also true is that Sobocinski does acknowledge that bombast and resultant threatening behavior of Trump supporters did have an affect on his employees.
I thought the Judge messed things up by not wanting to sign the diversion agreement. That’s when Weiss realized he was fukd and had to then pretend that he actually knew what his own investigation was all about.
Lol. That was a global plea that would have gone through for any other common defendant. With no issue, and no reportage. The Biden name is the only thing different.
I believe Marcy’s reporting is that the DoJ went into that hearing having already determined to renege on the plea deal.
May well be. All I know is, that plea should have gone through 99 out of 100 times.
My question is that can they use the information disclosed by Biden in the plea negotiations in the subsequent indictment? If so, it would mean that the IRS and the DOJ does not have universal access to information regarding a specific case.
If to a jury, most likely not. For other purposes to the court, maybe.
That would be a blatant 5A violation, unless they can show another avenue for the information being used, and I think it would also have to be gathered before any negotiations take place. Not sure what you are talking about in regards to what the IRS and DOJ share, they work hand in hand on any criminal cases only, since the IRS is restricted to bringing civil cases and need the DOJ to handle any criminal complaints.
Lol, no, unless otherwise stipulated to in the plea agreement, it could be used in sentencing, as other pertinent conduct can be.
I’ve only seen successful pleas. What’s to stop prosecutors from acting in bad faith?
Defense attorneys.
I think we’re talking about the same thing. They can’t use anything they get from the defense side from negotiations at trial. As far as I can tell, that would be the felony gun charge. Tax charges were misdemeanors and can only be felony if willfulness can be proved. Failure to pay on time is not enough to prove willfulness, or else they would be going after millions of taxpayers every year.
Yes. Though the nature of the pretrial and plea discussions is critical. Assuming it went normally, the contents of the stipulated plea would not be admissible. And Lowell is smart enough to have done it correctly I would think.
My point is that Shapely either did not make his reservations known or he sandbagged the DOJ and his bosses at the IRS in an effort to jail Hunter Biden.
It is not justice to make an example out of a recovering drug addict who paid the taxes. What Shapely did reeks of a political stunt.
In reference to Shapley, it was no doubt political. However, Weiss did not have to run with it, especially after all of the holes were uncovered before reneging on the plea deal.
That makes it Weiss’ issue alone. He could have stopped it if he wanted to and between the Comer Clown Committee pressure and his own standards, Weiss did not want to stop it.
What is this Steve Castor – Sobocinski interchange? Since Castor was Trumps impeachment lawyer my first take is that this elaboration on threats was an info war operation to suggest the threats were coming from Biden supporters. Second take, a Steve Castor own goal.
Ken Dilanian article on Sept 14th laid the threats on Trump supporters.
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/prosecutors-fbi-agents-hunter-biden-investigation-threatened-rcna104932
EW link
https://www.emptywheel.net/2023/09/15/after-threats-elicited-by-gary-shapleys-misleading-testimony-hunter-biden-prosecutors-reneged-on-the-plea-deal/
Around here, Ken Dilanian’s work usually needs verification.
Greengiant: Don’t confuse Steve Castor with Bruce Castor (trump’s lawyer in 2nd impeachment trial). They are cousins.
First impeachment is Steve.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/who-is-stephen-r-castor-the-gop-staff-attorney-in-the-impeachment-hearings/2019/11/12/4708df96-04a4-11ea-ac12-3325d49eacaa_story.html
Unsurprisingly, Castor tries to lead witnesses to get the answer he wants. Here, he was trying to get Sobocinski to affirm that Shapley’s public claims were true. He effectively said, no, rather, they were incitement.
OT: I don’t see a lot of reporting about it, but J. Michael Luttig was on MSNBC on Friday and spoke out about Trump’s attacks on the various judges in his legal cases. [Newsweek story] [The Hill story]
A quote from the Hill story:
Whatever one might think of Luttig, his message here is spot-on. Trump’s attacks on the system are obviously self-serving but the damage they are doing to American institutions, and people’s faith in those institutions, is disheartening. It feels like no other defendant would be allowed to express, day after day, the contempt for judges and courts that Trump gets away with (and also his legal team).
Right-wingers are losing faith in the courts due to Trump’s lies about them, and everyone else is losing faith in them because they are struggling to hold him accountable, without much success so far.
The Supreme Court could improve this situation if they were to slap his risible immunity arguments down hard. But I won’t hold my breath.
Example #34239 of shoddy reporting or right-wing bias (or most probably, both):
The Hill story I mentioned in the parent post (published on Friday March 29th) repeats some of Trump’s words from Wednesday where he slandered Judge Merchan’s daughter, but makes no mention that on Thursday a court spokesman explicitly denied that the deadbirdapp account belongs to Merchan’s daughter, even though The Hill published a story about that.
After Thursday, it seems grossly irresponsible for any media outlet to keep repeating Trump’s attacks on Merchan’s daughter without mentioning that a court spokesman has explicitly denied that she controls the account in question. Trump stories bring them lots of clicks but thats no excuse. (Yes, I know The Hill has a general right-wing bias)
This mediaite.com article has a video clip of the MSNBC segment. It begins with a great rant by Nicolle Wallace, and then Luttig’s comments.
https://www.mediaite.com/trump/nicolle-wallace-throws-out-script-in-disgust-after-trump-attacks-judges-and-their-kids/
Luttig: “… the former president is now actually campaigning for the presidency again, on the de-legitimization of America’s institutions of democracy and law.”
Longer video (11m) of the whole segment, at youtube
It’s good to remember that threats to players in the Trump legal dramas aren’t just made by MAGA’s against anyone involved in the prosecution of or opposition to Dear Leader. Anti Trumpists can also get into loops of fantasizing and threatening violence. I’ve allowed myself to contemplate that the latter, violence against MAGA, could precipitate a wave of reaction that features violence by MAGA. It’s my biggest fear in gaming out possible paths to dystopias.
Check your emotions and remember MAGA outguns nons probably 10,000 to 1. Fundamentally anti Trumpism must be non violent. I’m not saying that will win.
Interesting viewpoint.
By “outguns” are you talking about the total # of guns that MAGAts own vs. the rest of us? Might as well throw in the number of lethal rounds and types of weapons.
So each of these well-gunned MAGAts could perchance decide to go on personal rampages and try to take out as many of the rest of us as possible. Are you suggesting they would be able to succeed? Or are you implying that the threat of this happening would be enough to make the rest of us want to retreat?
I don’t think the outcome of such confrontations in the real world will be like the bully-boys expect. Sure they can inflict a ton of hurt but it wouldn’t help their “cause” (if they have one.)
You can only shoot one gun at a time. Despite being desensitized by the amount of gun violence in our country, it is not so easy to start shootings.
Might be worth remembering that the military ultimately call the shots, both actually and metaphorically, in any emergency situation. It might itself have its fair share of MAGAts, but it also has discipline. If that were to break down, then it becomes full-scale civil war. We’re nowhere near that by a very long way, despite the current tensions. So the gun thing is essentially a red herring. That’s not to say, though, that someone somewhere couldn’t get hurt or killed by someone with an itchy finger that’s been actuated.
What surprises me, given all the mutterings about intimidation, is why the selfsame authorities don’t seem to be bothering to investigate any of these supposed incidents. That’s not how the FBI operated back in the time of Eliot Ness. Although there can no longer be any doubt that MAGA is a mob racket, how much of this alleging is real and how much is merely a cover for insidious MAGA collaboration?
Other than that disturbed individual caught lurking around Obama, has anyone been identified then warned or charged with threatening behaviour? If not, why not…?
And we won’t know and shouldn’t know about ongoing investigations into targets of law enforcement – federal or state. I guess the old FBI Most Wanted List was a diversion.
But we usually hear about their successes or the egregious cases that make it into public view via the courts.
This Trump thing is a complete anomaly with the various branches of justice being seemingly stymied by bluster and layers of lawyering. I’m hoping that eventually many/all of these cases will succeed and put him and his hench-people in a place that will set an example.
“shithole countries”: where members of the judiciary are threatened or assassinated, brought to us by someone who speaks from his capo experience.
It seems as if Lowell’s strategy in the gun case is suppression and setting up his appeal. The case then stays alive until after the election. Based on Ms. Wheeler’s reporting, the government’s evidence appears dirty.
But on the tax case it seems to be a trial strategy. There’s no doubt that Biden’s taxes were messed up. But I think he has an explanation that would be accepted by jurors who are taxpayers and know others who have had to fix their tax debts. The tax case is meant to embarrass Hunter Biden and his father, but is it intended to get a conviction? Does the government get convictions when the returns have been filed and the tax debt paid?