Roger Stone – longtime Republican strategist and confidante of President Trump – has been convicted.
Earlier today, Stone was found guilty of all seven charges he faced, including obstruction of justice and witness tampering over his actions during the Mueller investigation.
He could face up to 50 years of jail time, although his sentencing trial will not happen until February, and his lawyers say they will appeal the conviction.
President Trump weighed in on the issue on Twitter, calling the verdict “a double standard like never before seen in the history of our Country”:
Folks on Twitter seem to agree:
Some are even calling on the president to pardon Stone:
Watch this clip from Fox News to hear more about the charges Roger Stone was found guilty of:
Roger Stone himself has claimed that the only things he is guilty of is "electing the President."
Before his trial, Stone pledged that he will not testify against President Trump "because I would have to bear false witness against him."
Watch:
The New York Times has more:
For decades, Roger J. Stone Jr. played politics as a kind of performance art, starring himself as a professional lord of mischief, as a friend once called him. He tossed bombs and spun tales from the political periphery with no real reckoning, burnishing a reputation as a dirty trickster.
On Friday morning, a reckoning arrived, the consequence of his efforts to sabotage a congressional investigation that threatened his longtime friend President Trump.
Mr. Stone, 67, was convicted in federal court of seven felonies for obstructing the congressional inquiry, lying to investigators under oath and trying to block the testimony of a witness whose account would have exposed his lies. Jurors deliberated for a little over seven hours before convicting him on all counts. Together, the charges carry a maximum prison term of 50 years.
In a last-minute bid for salvation, prosecutors said, Mr. Stone appealed to Mr. Trump for a pardon on Thursday, using a right-wing conspiracy theorist who runs the website Infowars as his proxy. Mr. Trump attacked the guilty verdict against Mr. Stone in a tweet on Friday but made no mention of a pardon.
To some friends, Mr. Stone’s fatal flaw was that he did not know when the time for gamesmanship was over. “The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about,” he liked to say. But that mantra seemed to ring hollow as Mr. Stone, forced to stand in silence, heard a courtroom deputy read the word “guilty” seven times.
The impeachment inquiry underway nearby on Capitol Hill overshadowed news of the verdict, but it was nonetheless another setback for the president. Mr. Stone is the sixth former Trump aide to be convicted in cases stemming from the investigation by the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election.
And the trial revived the saga of Russia’s efforts to bolster Mr. Trump’s chances of winning the White House just as House impeachment investigators are scrutinizing how Mr. Trump pressured another government, Ukraine, to help with his 2020 re-election chances.
Prosecutors said Mr. Stone tried to thwart the work of the House Intelligence Committee because the truth would have “looked terrible” for both Mr. Trump and his campaign. They built their case over the past week with testimony from a friend of Mr. Stone and two former Trump campaign officials: Rick Gates, the deputy campaign chairman, and Stephen K. Bannon, who led the campaign through its final three months and served as a White House strategist early in the administration.
Hundreds of exhibits that exposed Mr. Stone’s disdain for congressional and criminal investigators buttressed the testimony.
The evidence showed that in the months before the 2016 election, Mr. Stone strove to obtain emails that Russia had stolen from Democratic computers and funneled to WikiLeaks, which released them at strategic moments timed to damage Hillary Clinton, Mr. Trump’s Democratic opponent. “Every chance he got,” prosecutors said, Mr. Stone briefed the Trump campaign about whatever he had picked up about WikiLeaks’ plans.
CBS News also said:
President Trump's former campaign adviser, Roger Stone, was found guilty by a jury on Friday of all seven charges that he faced. He was charged with lying to Congress, witness tampering and obstruction.
Stone faces up to 50 years in prison — the witness tampering charge carries a maximum penalty of 20 years, while the maximum for each of the other six charges is five years.
The prosecution portrayed him as a liar trying to protect himself and help then-candidate Donald Trump win the 2016 presidential race at any cost.
"Roger Stone does not get to pick and choose which facts he thinks are important and lie about the rest of them," said prosecutor Jonathan Kravis in the closing arguments of the trial that ended a week earlier than expected.
Stone was accused of collaborating with WikiLeaks to release Democrats' emails that were hacked by Russia in order to damage Hillary Clinton, Mr. Trump's 2016 opponent — and of lying about it. He was also found guilty of tampering with a witness, radio personality Randy Credico, pressing him not to cooperate with a congressional investigation that involved Stone.
Prosecutors presented evidence throughout the trial that Stone tried to get information from WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, specifically asking for details about the hacked emails that WikiLeaks published in order to influence the 2016 election.
Join the conversation!
Please share your thoughts about this article below. We value your opinions, and would love to see you add to the discussion!