N.E. Brigand wrote: ↑Wed Dec 21, 2022 4:23 am
The
New York Times is
reporting that the former attorney for Trump White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson, Stefan Passantino, who was implied by the Committee to have encouraged Hutchinson to lie to them (she later changed lawyers and then was much more forthcoming with information about January 6th), has taken a leave of absence from his law firm so that he can defend his reputation against what the Committee's "false insinuations."
In the transcript of one of Cassidy Hutchinson's later interviews with the January 6th Committee, she
discusses how her previous lawyer, Stefan Passantino, convinced her not to tell the committee about what she had heard about Donald Trump's behavior in the presidential limousine following the rally. Passantino told her: (1) that the Committee was unlikely to know about it, and if they didn't ask her, she shouldn't volunteer it; (2) that it was an unimportant anecdote that wasn't relevant to the information sought by the committee; (3) that it was the responsibility of the man who told her that story, Tony Ornato, to share it with the committee; and (4) that his job as her lawyer was to get her into and out of the hearing as quickly as possible, following which "you're going to be taken care of. You're going to be done. It's going to be off your hands."
On the subject of when it had been determined in the White House that the events of January 6th would include not only the announced rally at the Ellipse but also an unpermitted march from the rally to the Capitol, Passantino told Cassidy: "We're not putting together timelines. The less you remember, the better."
If that's the sum of how Passantino coached Hutchinson not to tell the story, would he face any legal consequences? I don't know. Ethically I find this behavior outrageous, but that could just be me being naive about the law once more. Isn't there a duty to tell the *whole* truth?