What does a former staffer’s immunity deal mean for Hillary Clinton?
The revelation that the Justice Department has granted immunity to a former State Department staff member who worked on Hillary Clinton’s private email server is a likely indication that the investigation is nearing a conclusion, but should not be read as a sign that the leading Democratic presidential candidate is going to face criminal charges, legal experts said.
That Bryan Pagliano — a 2008 presidential campaign worker who set up the server in Clinton’s home — will avoid charges as he cooperates with FBI agents is a significant, if incremental, development, according to former federal prosecutors and white-collar defense lawyers who have been following the case.
It could mean that Pagliano, concerned about his legal exposure, might implicate others, including Clinton. But it also could be an indication that agents and prosecutors are winding down an inquiry that won’t result in charges, said Justin Shur, a former deputy chief of the Justice Department’s Public Integrity Section who now works in private practice at the MoloLamken firm.
“I don’t know that I would necessarily jump to the conclusion that this person has ‘flipped,’ and now they’re going to say a bunch of incriminating things about other people,” Shur said, adding that the agents could simply be making sure they have spoken to everyone relevant to the investigation.
...Immunized witnesses can be critical. Prosecutors offered a
generous immunity agreement to the businessman they said bribed former Virginia governor Robert F. McDonnell (R), and the businessman’s testimony at trial was pivotal to demonstrating the corrupt bargain between the two.
In Pagliano’s case, FBI agents and federal prosecutors probably want to know about the conversations he had with Clinton or her aides when he set up the server, said Matt Kaiser, a white-collar criminal defense lawyer at Kaiser, LeGrand & Dillon.
“It’s an interesting development,” Kaiser said. “I think they’re going to push it as far as they can. They’re going to want to know everything they can know before they make a decision to charge somebody or not.”
...The FBI is looking to wrap up the Clinton inquiry — a criminal investigation of the possible mishandling of classified information — in the coming months, according to a senior U.S. law enforcement official. There are no outward signs that prosecutors have convened a grand jury, a powerful tool that would allow them to subpoena witnesses.
...Edward B. MacMahon Jr., a lawyer who represented Sterling and Sept. 11 conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui, said that although prosecutors probably could charge Clinton, politics may prevent them from doing so. Justice Department guidelines, he said, discourage prosecutors from bringing cases in such a way that they influence elections.
“Almost anybody else already would have been receiving a target letter,” MacMahon said. “Of that, there isn’t any question in my mind.”
Jacob Frenkel, a white-collar criminal defense lawyer at the Shulman Rogers firm, said the immunity grant “raises exponentially the stakes in the investigation,” although because of the secrecy surrounding the investigation, it was hard to know where it might lead.
“This is a significant piece in providing clarity to an otherwise complicated jigsaw puzzle,” Frenkel said, “and we do not know exactly where Mr. Pagliano’s finger or fingers will point.”