While U.S. Attorney John Durham continues his criminal investigation into FISA abuse and other misconduct at the FBI, CIA, DIA and other federal government intelligence agencies, one of Special Counsel Robert Mueller allies was just sentenced to prison.
Mark Tolson, a former FBI analyst, illegally accessed the emails of right wing activist Jack Burkman in order to protect Mueller. He admitted to doing so in federal court last week. He will serve seven days behind bars and has been ordered to pay a $500 fine.
"I did what I did to try to protect Director Mueller, who can protect himself," Tolson told U.S. District Court Judge Leonie Brinkema.
After illegally sifting through emails, Tolson attempted to leak them to the press.
"After snooping through Burkman’s account, Tolson sent screenshots of the messages and offered the password to an unspecified journalist, court filings say," POLITICO reports.
Tolson's wife was also involved, but she wasn't charged. From the Washington Examiner:
Tolson's wife had the password to Burkman's email after doing some work for the lobbyist, and she provided the password to her husband. Tolson accessed Burkman's email and sent screenshots of messages as well as the login information to Burkman's email account to a journalist.
"This is actually a very serious offense," Brinkema said. "You're lucky. Your wife is lucky. The government could have prosecuted her as well."
"You can't just rummage through other people's accounts," Brinkema added. "You had to have known better."
Tolson's sentencing comes just weeks after DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz published a lengthy report revealing rampant FISA misconduct at the FBI against U.S. citizens associated with and supportive of the Trump campaign.
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