Dear readers,
We were kind of expecting Sean Combs to get indicted sooner or later, but we weren’t expecting the indictment to be for RICO. Federal prosecutors allege that Combs, as the leader of the “Combs Enterprise,” led a criminal organization for purposes including coercing female victims to have sex with male prostitutes at drug-fueled orgies known as “freak-offs.” Is that really RICO? Ken and I talk about why the federal government would choose to charge the case this way — it creates a federal hook for state crimes and avoids statute-of-limitations issue — and how the barebones indictment (just 14 pages; not the long, “speaking” narrative like you often see in white-collar cases) leaves us to guess what other evidence the government will offer to support that all these lurid details add up to a federally-criminal RICO conspiracy. We also discuss why Combs was denied bail.
Meanwhile, Ryan Wesley Routh, who was caught laying in wait for Donald Trump at his Florida golf course with a rifle, is also facing federal charges. So far, Routh faces only gun charges: being a felon in possession of a firearm, and having a firearm with an obliterated serial number. Remember: killing (or trying to kill) a presidential candidate is not itself a federal crime. Florida may try to charge Routh with attempted murder, but since Routh never fired a shot, they’ll have to see how they can prove that he was trying to kill Trump. The Feds may also find new theories of how Routh broke federal law. For now, the gun charges will have to do — and the feds are likely to get him imprisoned for many years, even if they’re all he gets convicted of.
There’s also been a bunch of hot, hot defamation action. The IRS agents who complained to Congress about the Hunter Biden prosecution are suing Biden’s lawyer, Abbe Lowell, for accusing them of various misconduct, including leaking information that the agents insist was already public. This case may take a while — lots of defamation cases get resolved fairly easily on the law, but the underlying facts will be important here: Lowell’s defense will likely hinge on whether his statements were true. Rudy Giuliani will not get to take advantage of New Hampshire’s long statute of limitations to sue Joe Biden over debate statements he made in 2020. And Tim Pool — fresh off being a “victim” of Russian payments to support his YouTube videos — is now suing Kamala Harris’s campaign, saying the campaign defamed him by calling him a Trump “operative” who wants Democrats to be executed. We do not expect this litigation to go very far.
We hope you enjoy the episode,
Josh
Share this post