by WorldTribune Staff, June 11, 2020
The judge who is attempting to continue the case against retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn weeks after the Department of Justice moved to dismiss it “has exceeded his power,” Flynn’s attorney, Sidney Powell, said in a 26-page appeals court brief filed on Wednesday.
Powell, a former federal prosecutor who took over Flynn’s representation last summer, argued that Judge Emmet Sullivan “has exceeded his power now precisely because General Flynn proclaimed his innocence and pursued a vigorous defense of his constitutional rights as soon as he retained unconflicted counsel,” Powell said.
In a reference to Sullivan’s 2018 suggestion that Flynn had committed treason, which the judge walked back with an apology, Powell argued the judge’s “proclivity for grabbing world-wide headlines by suggesting General Flynn has committed heinous crimes that don’t exist is once again on display.”
“Article II, Section 3 of the Constitution vests the power to execute the laws solely in the Executive Branch,” Powell argued. “Accordingly, the power to prosecute — to decide who, when, where, and how someone is charged with a federal crime — rests entirely with the Department of Justice.”
The DOJ told a U.S. district court last month “that continued prosecution of this case would not serve the interests of justice” as it sought to drop the false statements charges against Flynn.
Judge Sullivan, a Bill Clinton appointee, instead appointed retired New York federal Judge John Gleeson to serve as an amicus curiae to present arguments in opposition to the DOJ’s motion and to explore whether Flynn should be charged with perjury.
Powell said the appeal’s court’s “intervention is needed now — not after Respondent and his Amicus create a circus and sentence an innocent man.” She argued that “to allow Respondent to do anything other than grant the Motion to Dismiss would erode the authority of this Court, its precedent, the Constitution, and the Article II power” of the Justice Department.
“This Court must stop him before he further jeopardizes the legitimacy of the federal judiciary,” Powell said of Sullivan. “Accordingly, mandamus should issue to dismiss this case with prejudice, vacate the plea, and order any further proceedings conducted by a different judge.”
Rep. Jim Jordan, Ohio Republican, admonished the findings of Gleeson, who on Wednesday argued that the DOJ was guilty of a “gross abuse of prosecutorial power.”
“This judge is talking about abuse of power now?” Jordan said in a Fox News interview. “The abuse of power was then. This is how the Left operates, and I think the American people see this for what it is.”
“What’s rich here is Judge Gleeson using the term ‘abuse of power.’ Are you kidding me?” said Jordan. “First of all, a few years ago, Judge Gleeson said a prosecutor can drop the case at any time for any reason. Now, he’s suddenly changed, which shows how political this is from his perspective and, I think, from Judge Sullivan’s perspective.”
Jordan said the hypocrisy from the two judges was “crazy” before walking through the timeline of the Flynn investigation. He noted that FBI agent Peter Strzok instructed the agency to keep Flynn’s case open after agents investigating his December 2016 phone call with former Russian Ambassador to the United States Sergey Kislyak found “no derogatory information.”
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