McCabe lawyer presses Justice Department to drop criminal case
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[September 14, 2019]
By Andy Sullivan
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A lawyer for former
FBI official Andrew McCabe pressed U.S. prosecutors on Friday to drop
their politically sensitive case against him, citing reports that
suggest they may be having trouble securing criminal charges.
The U.S. Justice Department has been investigating McCabe, the FBI's
former No. 2 official, for more than 1-1/2 years over allegations he
misled internal investigators about his decision to share internal
communications with a reporter at the height of the 2016 presidential
election.
Prosecutors and senior officials within the Justice Department,
including Deputy Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen, have recommended moving
forward with criminal charges, according to sources familiar with the
investigation.
But they might have encountered another hurdle. The Washington Post
reported on Thursday that a federal grand jury investigating the case
had been called back to consider evidence, but had left without
returning an indictment.
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Grand juries are used in the U.S. legal system to assess the validity of
possible criminal charges in major cases.
To obtain an indictment, U.S. prosecutors typically need to convince the
grand jury there is probable cause that a crime has been committed,
which is a lower legal standard than that needed to secure a guilty
verdict at trial. Proceedings are conducted in secret.
The Justice Department and the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District
of Columbia, which is handling the case, declined to comment.
In an email shared with reporters, McCabe's lawyer, Michael Bromwich,
urged U.S. Attorney Jesse Liu to submit a report saying whether or not
the grand jury had recommended criminal charges.
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![](../images/091419pics/news_t35.jpg)
FBI Acting Director Andrew McCabe speaks during a news conference
announcing the takedown of the dark web marketplace AlphaBay, at the
Justice Department in Washington, U.S., July 20, 2017. REUTERS/Aaron
P. Bernstein/File Photo
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He also said prosecutors should not try to win grand-jury approval a
second time if they have failed.
"If the grand jury voted not to approve charges, it did not find
probable cause. Therefore, it is simply not reasonable to believe
that a trial jury would find Mr. McCabe guilty," Bromwich wrote.
McCabe was fired in March 2018, just hours before he was due to
retire, after the department's internal watchdog issued a report
saying he misled investigators who were trying to determine whether
he improperly shared information with a news reporter during the
2016 presidential election.
McCabe has said he tried to answer questions about the incident
truthfully and clarified his responses when he thought he had been
misunderstood.
McCabe has endured years of criticism by President Donald Trump
after playing a key role in the investigation into the Trump
campaign's ties to Russia in the 2016 election.
McCabe has said those attacks are part of an effort to undermine law
enforcement and intelligence professionals. He has sued the Justice
Department, arguing that he was fired for political reasons.
(Reporting by Andy Sullivan; Editing by Tom Brown)
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