Bijan Rafiekian is a California businessman and former business partner of Trump ally Michael Flynn.
Bijan Rafiekian is shown leaving the FBI Washington Field Office in Washington, Monday, Dec. 17, 2018. | Jacquelyn Martin/AP PhotoThe Justice Department has quietly abandoned one of the last prosecutions stemming from investigations into alleged foreign influence over Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign.
However, U.S. District Court Judge Anthony Trenga — who presided over the trial — soon became convinced that the guilty verdicts were not justified by the evidence prosecutors presented. He set aside the verdicts two months later, prompting years of additional litigation that included two trips to the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals.the Justice Department submitted in federal court in Alexandria, Va.
“Mr. Rafiekian has been the target of baseless federal prosecution for the past five years, only because he made the poor decision to be in business with Michael Flynn. Along with his family and his lawyers, Bijan is particularly grateful to the Court for its unwavering commitment to equity and for ensuring that justice would be done,” MacDougall added., but left the door open for the judge, an appointee of President George W. Bush, to grant the defendant a new trial.
Initial stages of the foreign-agent investigation into Flynn and Rafiekian’s work related to Turkey were handled by federal prosecutors in Alexandria, but the inquiry was later folded into special counsel Robert Mueller’s broader probe. That office eventually sent the case back to the Alexandria-based prosecutors for trial.
Flynn, who served as national security adviser for 24 days at the outset of the Trump administration before being fired, had been expected to be a key witness at Rafiekian’s trial. He had been expected to offer testimony that would incriminate his former partner in a scheme to avoid disclosing that the Flynn Intel Group’s lobbying and public relations effort was actually directed and controlled by Turkish government officials.
After a review, Attorney General Bill Barr moved to drop the prosecution of Flynn. Eventually, a judge agreed. But there was no similar move for Rafiekian, and the proceedings against him continued.a broadly worded pardon
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