Justice Department charges former FBI Director James Comey for third time
By Katelyn Polantz, Hannah Rabinowitz, CNN
(CNN) — The Justice Department criminally charged former FBI Director James Comey for the third time.
Comey is charged over a leak of a sensitive national security document when he was FBI director in October 2016, according to court records made public Monday.
Few additional details are available in the court record, though charges were first filed against Comey in the DC District Court on Oct. 5 — 10 years after the alleged transmission of the document.
The Justice Department, however, says it is still seeking to bring its case to a grand jury for an indictment and that the Oct. 5 filing is intended to buy time before the statute of limitations ended.
“The Department filed a waiverless criminal information to toll the statute of limitations as it relates to allegations concerning former FBI Director Comey,” a DOJ Filing a criminal information to toll the statute of limitations is a widely recognized practice in federal court and has been approved by multiple Circuit Courts of Appeals. This is an ongoing criminal investigation, and we will not comment further.”
In sealed court proceedings this month, Comey moved to dismiss the case, saying that there needs to be an indictment within 10 years and that the DOJ filing does not suffice.
“An indictment fundamentally differs from an information,” his lawyers said in a court filing.
“It would almost be funny if it weren’t such an appalling abuse of the Department of Justice, one that we cannot become numb to,” Comey said in a video.
The case was unsealed on Monday.
“This is a bizarre, and likely improper, use of a criminal ‘information’ ’to end-run the statute of limitations,” Elie Honig, a former federal prosecutor and CNN’s senior legal analyst, said. “Typically an information must be agreed to by a defendant — and Comey did not consent here. It therefore likely cannot extend the statute of limitations, which would have expired on October 5, 2026.”
Comey faces a separate criminal charge still in coastal North Carolina, for allegedly threatening the president in a social media post.
A previous case against Comey was dismissed.
This story is breaking and will be updated.
The-CNN-Wire
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