‘Missing’ Transcript of Trump Prosecutor Presenting Evidence Becomes Key Flashpoint In Comey Trial, Argues Legal Analyst

Magistrate Judge William Fitzpatrick ordered DOJ prosecutor Lindsey Halligan to immediately turn over grand jury records to former FBI Director James Comey’s defense team on Monday. Judge Fitzpatrick wrote a scathing takedown of Halligan, who Trump handpicked as the interim United States attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, and argued that Comey’s perjury prosecution could be derailed by “government misconduct.”

MS legal and national affairs reporter Fallon Gallagher weighed in on the order on air Monday and highlighted that a “chunk” of “missing” transcript could become a key flashpoint in getting the case dismissed.

“Fallon, what’s going on?” asked anchor Chris Jansing.

“Yeah, Chris. The magistrate judge who is overseeing the question of the grand jury material and proceedings has just ordered that the prosecution must hand over all of those grand jury proceedings and the accompanying audio from that presentation to Comey’s defense team. Now, this is a really rare move for a judge to do something like this, and ordinarily would be the headline in and of itself,” Gallagher replied, adding:

But the real big news in this case, in this update, comes from the judge’s opinion, where it’s particularly scathing. But he hints that there’s potential misconduct from those jury proceedings that could be grounds for the Comey team to actually dismiss the case. And I want to read you the one line that really stood out to me. He says that there is a, quote, “disturbing pattern of profound investigative missteps” that, quote, “potentially undermine the integrity of grand jury proceedings.”

So he’s basically giving an opening to the Comey defense team to file a new motion to dismiss this case once they go through this grand jury material and see what those missteps might have been—those alleged missteps—and the Comey team could file a new defense motion to dismiss the case.

Now, all of this comes amid a flurry of other defense motions that he’s filed to dismiss the case. There’s actually a hearing this coming Wednesday on his motion for selective and vindictive prosecution, so we’ll hear arguments on that this week. And you’ll remember last week we were at court in Alexandria for that Lindsey Halligan hearing about the motion to dismiss based on her potential ineligibility to serve.

And one thing that I want to point out from that hearing that has just become so much more important is that we learned that there was a chunk of that grand jury proceeding transcript that was missing. So that is to say that there is a chunk of time when Lindsey Halligan was in that grand jury room presenting the case without a court reporter. And that is the last few minutes between the end of her presentation and when she secured that indictment. So as the Comey team reviews all of this, that will become incredibly important, Chris.

Watch the clip above via MS NOW.