Interim U.S. Attorney Lindsey Halligan is facing a new humiliation over her prosecution of former FBI Director James Comey.
It was revealed in court that the grand jury never saw the final indictment against Comey.
The bombshell development is the latest in a series of setbacks for the one-time beauty pageant contestant and former personal Trump lawyer turned prosecutor who brought the case.
Halligan, who had no prosecutorial experience before being tapped for the job, conceded that the full grand jury never reviewed the final indictment against Comey.
Instead of presenting a new indictment to the grand jury after it declined to approve one count, she instead brought an alternative version for the jury’s foreperson to sign, prosecutors said in a jaw-dropping exchange, detailed by CNN.
Judge Michael Nachmanoff for the Eastern District of Virginia then called Halligan up and asked her to confirm that the full grand jury never actually saw the new indictment.
Halligan clarified that there was one additional grand juror in the magistrate’s courtroom.
After Nachmanoff told her to sit back down, he asked prosecutor Tyler Lemons whether he understood correctly that the new document had never been presented to the grand jury for approval.
“I wasn’t there, but that is my understanding,” Lemons said as Halligan was the only one to present the case.
After that, Comey’s lawyer argued that no indictment had been returned and that “there is no indictment.”
The former FBI chief was charged in late September with lying to Congress and obstructing a congressional proceeding.
The charge was brought as the statue of limitation was about to expire.
The revelation that the full grand jury never saw the altered indictment is the latest in a series of challenges for a case already in peril.
Comey’s team has also tried to have Halligan disqualified from the case, arguing her appointment was illegal.
A federal judge last week said she would decide on it before Thanksgiving, but also pointed out that a section of the grand jury transcript was missing.
District Judge Cameron McGowan Currie called out Attorney General Pam Bondi last Thursday because Bondi indicated she had reviewed the grand jury proceedings while attempting to shore up the case.
A separate federal judge on Monday slammed the Justice Department for a “disturbing pattern of profound investigative missteps.”
U.S. Magistrate Judge William Fitzpatrick warned the botched probe could even result in one or more charges being dismissed.
Nachmanoff on Wednesday directed the Justice Department to respond by 5 pm ET with a filing in response to the revelation that Halligan never presented the final charges that Comey now faces to the grand jury for approval.
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