Retired three-star general and former Trump national security advisor Michael Flynn is suing the federal government for an expected $50 million over the Department of Justice’s criminal prosecution of him in 2017.
Flynn’s legal team notes at the beginning of a draft legal filing obtained by The Western Journal that in May 2020, the DOJ moved to dismiss the false statement charge brought against him in November 2017.
However, D.C. District Court Judge Emmet Sullivan would not allow the charges to be dropped even after the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals ordered him to do so.
Finally, on Nov. 25, 2020, then-President Donald Trump pardoned Flynn and Sullivan dismissed the case.
Flynn argues in his suit that the entire case was politically motivated as part of the Crossfire Hurricane investigation, which the FBI justified in part based on the infamous dossier compiled by former British intelligence agent Christopher Steele.
That dossier was paid for by the Democratic National Committee and the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign as a means to damage then-GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump.
Flynn’s lawyers allege that, having been unable to establish that Flynn was working as a Russian agent, the FBI sent agents including Peter Strzok to interview him at the White House on Jan. 24, 2017, days after Trump took office, without informing the decorated combat veteran that he was the subject of an investigation and could be criminally charged.
Flynn, whom Trump had named as his pick for national security advisor, was charged with making a false statement regarding phone conservations he had had with then-Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak during the transition from the Obama to Trump administrations.
Strzok and FBI agent Joe Pientka asked Flynn about the nature of the conversations, though they had transcripts of them and knew what was said, and that the subject matter was legitimate for the incoming national security advisor to be discussing.
The pretense for having the meeting at all was to determine if Flynn had violated the Logan Act by speaking to Kislyak. The Logan Act became law during the John Adams administration in 1799 and makes it a crime for unauthorized American citizens to negotiate with foreign governments.
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It has never been successfully prosecuted.
“During this interview, FBI agents Strzok and Pientka were attempting to trap General Flynn in a misstatement or omission so that they could charge him with a false statement violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1001. This malicious intent continued throughout the FBI’s investigation and the subsequent investigation and prosecution by the Special Counsel’s office,” Flynn’s court filing alleges.
The motivation to have Flynn charged and removed as national security advisor was to prevent him from getting in the way of the Crossfire Hurricane investigation.
“Defendant’s agents were acutely aware that General Flynn [as former director of the Defense Intelligence Agency] was one of few people in the Trump White House with the authority and the intelligence background to uncover and expose the Crossfire Hurricane debacle,” the lawsuit states.
In the DOJ’s motion to dismiss the charges against Flynn in May 2020, Timothy Shea, then-U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, wrote, “The Government is not persuaded that the January 24, 2017 interview was conducted with a legitimate investigative basis and therefore does not believe Mr. Flynn’s statements were material even if untrue.”
“Moreover, we [do] not believe that the Government can prove either the relevant false statements or their materiality beyond a reasonable doubt.”
Flynn’s suit says the federal government’s prosecution of him cost him tens of millions of dollars.
“As a direct and proximate result of Defendant’s actions, General Flynn suffered harm. He was falsely branded as a traitor to his country, lost at least tens of millions of dollars of business opportunities and future lifetime earning potential, was maliciously prosecuted and spent substantial monies in his own defense,” the suit says.
ABC News reported in 2018 that Flynn was selling his Alexandria, Virginia, home to help pay his legal bills.
In light of the federal government’s “wrongful and malicious” prosecution, Flynn’s legal team anticipates that a trial court will determine the compensatory damages due him exceed $50 million.
