November 23, 2018
THE TIGHTENING NOOSE:
Bad News for Trump? Judge in Russia Case Says Collusion Could Be Enough for Criminal Charge (Ronn Blitzer, November 23rd, 2018, lAW & cRrIME)
"This court ruling should drive another nail in the coffin of the argument that collusion is not a crime. It clearly can be, and the crime is conspiracy - even if no other independent criminal violations are identified," wrote Randall Eliason, a former federal prosecutor and lecturer at George Washington Law School. "Mueller's use of that theory in his Russian social media indictment is a textbook example of a 371 conspiracy to defraud the U.S., and that theory has now been validated by the trial judge's ruling."As U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich explained in his opinion last week, there are two ways to violate 18 U.S.C. 371. One can either "conspire ... to commit any offense against the United States," which is conspiracy in the traditional sense, or one can conspire "to defraud the United States, or any agency thereof in any manner or for any purpose[.]"For either method of conspiracy, one must have an agreement with another party to carry out the conspiracy, an then at least one party must "do any act to effect the object of the conspiracy."
Pity the poor Trumpbots and their argument that, "Sure, it was collusion, but that's not a crime..."
Posted by Orrin Judd at November 23, 2018 3:15 PM