Cox: Libous indictment not credible

Official NY GOP statement

ALBANY… NYGOP Chair Ed Cox today released the following memo regarding the federal indictment of State Senator Tom Libous.

“Allegations too thin, press releases too thick, timing too political for indictment to be credible”

Allegations too thin

This highly unusual, three-page, one-count indictment stems from an unrecorded conversation of an unannounced visit to Sen. Libous from FBI agents that took place four years ago.

Sen. Libous was indicted under a rarely used 1863 statute. In 1998, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, writing in regards to that statute, warned against “the extraordinary authority Congress, perhaps unwittingly, has conferred on prosecutors to manufacture crimes.”

Press releases too thick

That the US Attorneys are straining to create a crime is evident in the public statements of the US Attorney and the Assistant FBI Director, which make false statements regarding the allegations in their indictment.

The US Attorney stated that Sen. Libous is “alleged” to have abused his office “corruptly causing lobbyists…to funnel money through a law firm…”

The Assistant FBI Director said, “As alleged… Senator Libous used his political position to garner favorable treatment for himself…”

Neither of those statements tells the truth about the actual indictment, which alleges nothing of the sort, probably because there is insufficient evidence to support those statements.

There is only one count in the indictment: allegedly lying to the FBI about things that happened nine years ago in an unrecorded conversation of an unannounced visit that took place four years ago.

Without a recording, prosecutors cannot win in court, so they’re trying to conduct this trial in the press against a terminally ill State Senator.

Timing too political

The timing of this indictment is too political to be credible: are we really to believe that federal officials conducted this conversation four years ago, but by coincidence brought the indictment precisely at a time when Andrew Cuomo has thrown in his lot with the radical left Working Families Party and New York City’s Mayor Bill de Blasio to put downstate Democrats in control of the State Senate? And with just enough time left in the petitioning process for Democrats presently on the sidelines to formally challenge Sen. Libous?

If this weak case ever goes to trial, the FBI and Attorney General Holder’s very political Justice Department will be the de facto defendants.