Federal prosecutors say Roger Stone violated his gag order, according to court filing Thursday.
Prosecutors with the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Washington, D.C., say Mr. Stone’s posts on Instagram and Facebook violated a gag order that barred him from speaking about his case.
“In the past several days, Stone posted statements on social media about this case and the special counsel’s investigation and appears to have specifically targeted those posts at major media outlets,” they wrote in the filing.
“On or about June 18 and 19, 2019, the defendant posted to Instagram and Facebook, commenting about this case and inviting news organizations to cover the issue,” prosecutors wrote. “This is a violation of the current conditions of release.”
Over the past two days, Mr. Stone posted multiple times, accusing the FBI of relying on CrowdStrike — a firm hired by the Democratic National Committee to investigate the hacking of its computers — to conclude Russians infiltrated the Trump campaign. The Justice Department denied the allegation, noting that special counsel Robert Mueller also concluded the claim was untrue.
“Stone’s most recent posts represent a direct attempt to appeal to major media outlets to publish information that is not relevant to, but may prejudice, this case,” prosecutors wrote.
Prosecutors are seeking a separate hearing on the matter, saying the rhetoric could influence potential jurors.
In February, Judge Amy Berman Jackson barred Mr. Stone from making public statements about the case after he posted an Instagram photo of her near crosshairs. He apologized to Judge Jackson, but she warned him that if he did it again she would severely reprimand him.
Mr. Stone has pleaded not guilty to charges of lying to Congress, obstruction of justice and witness tampering. Prosecutors say he lied about his efforts to contact Wikileaks founder Julian Assange about Hillary Clinton’s hacked emails.
• Jeff Mordock can be reached at jmordock@washingtontimes.com.
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