US special counsel recommends six months in prison for Papadopoulos
US Special Counsel Robert Mueller has recommended that President Donald Trump’s former election campaign aide George Papadopoulos be imprisoned up to six months for lying to federal agents investigating whether Russia interfered in the 2016 US presidential election.
Mueller made the recommendation in a court filing on Friday. According to Mueller’s sentencing memorandum to a federal judge, Papadopoulos lied about his contacts with people who claimed to have ties to top Russian officials.
Papadopoulos pleaded guilty in October to lying to FBI agents and is scheduled to be sentenced on September 7.
“The defendant’s crime was serious and caused damage to the government’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election,” Mueller’s memo said.
“The defendant lied in order to conceal his contacts with Russians and Russian intermediaries during the campaign and made his false statements to investigators on January 27, 2017, early in the investigation, when key investigative decisions, including who to interview and when, were being made,” Mueller said.
Mueller said the government believed a sentence of up to six months in prison was “appropriate and warranted” along with a fine of $9,500.
Papadopoulos unwittingly played a key role in triggering the FBI investigation into possible collusion between Trump’s campaign and Russia. While drinking at a London bar in May 2016, he told the Australian ambassador to the UK that the Russians had hacked thousands of emails that could damage the election campaign of Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.
When the emails began appearing publicly two months later, the Australian envoy, Alexander Downer, told American diplomats about what Papadopoulos had said, according to US officials familiar with the events.
Mueller also said Papadopoulos avoided until the last moment telling prosecutors about a cell phone he used in London that had “substantial communications” on it between he and a professor who claimed to know about Russian information on Clinton.
Mueller is leading a federal investigation into alleged Russian interference in the 2016 US presidential election, and any possible cooperation with Trump’s presidential campaign.
Trump has repeatedly denied allegations that his campaign colluded with Moscow and has condemned the ongoing US federal investigations over the alleged meddling, drawing accusations from Democratic and Republican Party lawmakers alike that he is ignoring a threat to American democracy.
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