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By Beth Stibal |

Prosecutors Resign Over DOJ’s Reduction of Roger Stone’s Sentence Recommendation

UPDATE: President Trump is congratulating Attorney General Bill Barr for stepping in on the sentencing of his friend and Broward resident Roger Stone. Trump tweeted this morning that the case was totally out of control and probably should have never been brought.

Federal prosecutors originally recommended a seven-to-nine year prison sentence for Stone, but the Justice Department intervened and pushed for a more lenient sentence. The Department of Justice announced it was changing the recommendation for Stone’s sentencing for lying to law enforcement officers and obstruction of Congress. Prosecutors had originally called for a sentence of up to nine years. The DOJ now wants a sentence far less than that. In protest, all four prosecutors in the Roger Stone case are resigning. Lead prosecutor Aaron Zelinsky as well as his three associates Michael Marando, Jonathan Kravis, and Adam Jed are leaving the case. Zelinsky was a part of former Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s team. As a result, Democrats are furious about the DOJ’s intervention into the sentencing phase of the Roger Stone trial. During a Senate hearing, Ohio Democrat Sherrod Brown accused Republicans of giving Trump a “permanent license to turn the presidency and the executive branch into his own personal vengeance operation.” Roger Stone is a longtime Trump ally who was convicted in November of lying to Congress and witness tampering. Senator Brown warned that Trump’s behavior will only get worse after his acquittal in the Senate impeachment trial. He said, “The retribution tour will continue.” Brown cited the dismissal of Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman from the National Security Council and the recall of Gordon Sondland, the U.S. ambassador to the European Union. Both men testified in House impeachment hearings. (Washington, DC) — President Trump is reacting to the Justice Department’s sentence recommendation for Broward resident Roger Stone. President Trump said in a tweet, “It’s a horrible and very unfair situation” that federal prosecutors want his longtime confidant and former campaign adviser Roger Stone to go to prison for seven to nine years.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office in Washington, DC made that request in a sentencing memo submitted Monday. In a tweet this morning, Trump explained the real crimes “were on the other side, as nothing happens to them.” He added this miscarriage of justice cannot be allowed. The 67-year-old Stone was arrested in an early morning raid at his Broward home. He was charged in relation to investigations by the House Intelligence Committee and former special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation. Stone was found guilty in November of seven charges including obstruction of justice, lying to Congress and witness tampering in connection to the investigation into Russian election interference. Stone is scheduled to be sentenced next week on February 20th.