Roger Stone’s Crimes

President Donald Trump has criticized the Justice Department for prosecuting the president’s longtime associate Roger Stone and recommending that Stone serve up to nine years in prison. That’s his opinion, but he falsely supports it by claiming Stone did “nothing” and “nobody even can define what he did.”

The Justice Department summed it up this way in November when the jury rendered its verdict: “Stone was found guilty of obstruction of a congressional investigation, five counts of making false statements to Congress, and tampering with a witness.”

All of the charges stemmed from Stone’s attempts to thwart the House intelligence committee’s investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.

Trump: Stone Treated ‘Very Badly’
On Feb. 10, the Department of Justice recommended a sentence ranging from 87 months to 108 months, or roughly seven to nine years, saying “[o]bstructing such critical investigations … strikes at the very heart of our American democracy.” Trump objected on Twitter, and a day later the department filed an updated sentencing recommendation memo that left the decision up to the judge — resulting in four federal prosecutors to withdrawing from the case.