The special counsel’s office added obstruction of justice charges to the counts lodges against former Trump campaign chief Paul Manafort in a superseding indictment released Friday.
Robert Mueller, the special counsel, says Mr. Manafort and a longtime business associated, Konstantin Kilimnik, tried to skew testimony of witnesses in the investigation into Mr. Manafort’s operations.
The indictment lodges both obstruction and conspiracy to obstruct justice charges, saying the conduct happened earlier this year. The indictment doesn’t give details, but in another court motion earlier this week Mr. Mueller said Mr. Manafort tried to get a witness to lie for him in court.
Mr. Manafort stands accused of illegal lobbying and laundering money from his work for Ukrainian clients, and of later lying to investigators to hide his conduct.
He has asserted his innocence, and is free on bail.
But earlier this week the special counsel asked a judge to revoke bail and said Mr. Manafort had tried to tamper with witnesses/
The prosecutors pointed to two witnesses, identified in the documents as D1 and D2.
In the case of the former Mr. Manafort reached out to suggest they talk about details of matters under investigation. The person identified as D1 said the contacts seemed like an effort to “suborn perjury” because he knew the information Mr. Manafort said he wanted to share was inaccurate.
In the case of D2, a Manafort associate reached out to say Mr. Manafort was looking to share with the witness his own version of “what’s going on.”
The conspiracy charges were added as courts six and seven to the indictment in federal district court in Washington, D.C.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.
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