Durham investigation: Judge Narrows Trial of Analyst Who Reported Salacious Claims About Trump
Source: New York Times
Judge Narrows Trial of Analyst Who Reported Salacious Claims About Trump
Charlie Savage and Adam Goldman
Sun, October 9, 2022 at 12:39 PM·7 min read
WASHINGTON — John H. Durham, the Trump-era special counsel, set off political reverberations last year when he unveiled a lengthy indictment of an analyst he accused of lying to the FBI about sources for the so-called Steele dossier, a discredited compendium of political opposition research about purported ties between Donald Trump and Russia.
But the trial of the analyst, Igor Danchenko, which opens Tuesday with jury selection in federal court in Alexandria, Virginia, now appears likely to be shorter and less politically salient than the sprawling narrative in Durham’s indictment had suggested the proceeding would be.
In an 18-page order last week, the judge overseeing the case, Anthony J. Trenga of the Eastern District of Virginia, excluded from the trial large amounts of information that Durham had wanted to showcase — including material that undercuts the credibility of the dossier’s notorious rumor that Russia had a blackmail tape of Trump with prostitutes.
Certain facts Durham dug up related to that rumor “do not qualify as direct evidence as they are not ‘inextricably intertwined’ or ‘necessary to provide context’ to the relevant charge,” Trenga wrote, adding that they “were substantially outweighed by the danger of confusion and unfair prejudice.”
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Read more: https://news.yahoo.com/judge-narrows-trial-analyst-reported-163958399.html
Original NYT link (paywall): https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/09/us/politics/durham-trump-steele-dossier-trial.html
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