Legal Fight Erupts After Feds Make New Claims About Butina Ahead Of Sentencing
(Talking Points Memo) Maria Butina, the Russian national who ingratiated herself into U.S. conservative circles through gun rights activism, has been cooperating with the feds for months, but just days before her sentencing, a major fight has erupted over the government’s efforts to paint her conduct as part of a “spot and assess” operation that could aid Russian spies.
The fight bubbled up in dueling sentencing memos filed Friday from Butina’s attorneys and prosecutors in the U.S. attorney’s office in D.C.
Butina was originally charged with failure to register as an agent of Russia and with conspiracy against the U.S. In December, she reached a plea deal that had her admitting to engaging in a conspiracy not to register as an agent of a foreign country.
Her sentencing is scheduled for Friday.
Not surprisingly, her lawyers filed a sentencing memo that painted her in the most flattering light possible.
“All told, her motivations weren’t nefarious. Maria was genuinely interested in improving relations between the two countries, and she had no ill intent,” the sentencing memo said.
They are asking that she serve no additional prison time — she’s been incarcerated since her arrest last July — and she has already agreed to be deported swiftly once she’s completed her sentence.
The government, however, appears ready to throw the book at her, even though they filed with the court a separate letter that described her “substantial assistance.” They are recommending she serve an additional 18 months in prison — a recommendation that would have been 24 months had she not cooperated.
Their sentencing memo included a declaration from an ex-FBI agent and expert in “cyber security and intrusions by nation-state actors.” The ex-agent, Robert Anderson assessed Butina’s conduct as being part of a so-called “spot and assess” effort — that is, that she was allegedly helping to identify vulnerable targets in the U.S. who may susceptible to recruitment by Russian spy operations in the future.
Among the new claims made public for the first time in the government sentencing filings is that Butina, in November 2016, sought to influence the incoming Trump administration’s choice for secretary of state.
“Butina provided Russia with information that has tremendous intelligence value,” Anderson said in his declaration, adding that it was the type of information that “skilled intelligence officers can exploit for years and that may cause significant damage to the United States.”
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https://talkingpointsmemo.com/muckraker/maria-butina-sentencing-spot-and-assess
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