“He lied to the House Intelligence Committee because the truth looked bad — it looked bad to the Trump campaign, and it looked bad to Donald Trump,” the prosecutor said. “Roger Stone wanted to hide what he had done because the truth looked bad.”

Stone, an on-again-off-again political ally and confidant of President Trump for three decades, who by the summer of 2016 was an informal adviser with Trump’s campaign, reached out to Assange, who was suspected of having tens of thousands of stolen Democratic emails, which special counsel Robert Mueller later determined to have been stolen by Russian military intelligence.

“The defendant thought those emails would help his friend Trump and hurt Clinton,” Zelinsky said.

Prosecutors allege Stone tried to contact Assange by using conspiracy theorist Jerome Corsi and radio host Randy Credico as conduits, though he allegedly misled Congress in 2017 by concealing months-long Wikileaks discussions with Corsi, telling the committee he’d only reached out to WikiLeaks through Credico. Stone then allegedly worked to stop Credico from telling the House, including by threatening to kidnap Credico’s dog, Bianca, and calling him a “rat” and a “stoolie.”

DOJ said Stone lied in five different ways, including about: not having any emails or text messages related to Assange, when in reality he had dozens of such communications; about only having one intermediary; about not making any requests related to Assange, when in reality he requested that Corsi go to the Ecuadorian embassy in London to get the pending WikiLeaks emails from Assange and asked Credico to ask Assange whether he had damaging info about Libya and Clinton; about not having any records of his communications with his WikiLeaks intermediaries, when in reality he had hundreds; and about his discussions with the Trump campaign.

Stone “regularly updated members of the Trump campaign at the senior levels about whatever updates he thought he had about WikiLeaks … including all the way to the top of the Trump campaign, to the campaign’s CEO, Steve Bannon,” said Zelensky. Bannon is also expected to testify.

Zelinsky said Stone was communicating with Trump ally Erik Prince and former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, too.

The prosecutor also sought to head off likely arguments from Stone’s legal team, challenging the assessment that Russia interfered in 2016.

“This case is not about who hacked the Democratic National Committee’s servers. This case is not about whether Roger Stone had any communications with Russians. This case is not about politics. This case is about Roger Stone’s misrepresentations to the House Intelligence Committee and Roger Stone’s efforts to tamper with a witness,” Zelinsky said.

The jury of 12 members and two alternates in the case, which was spun-off from special counsel Robert Mueller’s two-year investigation, includes 11 women and three men. Wednesday’s proceedings were attended by former Mueller team member James Quarles and former Mueller prosecutor Aaron Zebley, who appeared with Mueller during his hearing in front of the House Judiciary and Intelligence Committees in July.

Stone, who left Tuesday’s jury selection early blaming food poisoning, was back in court Wednesday for its conclusion and opening statements.

The judge on Wednesday condemned efforts by some to attack one of the members of Tuesday’s jury pool over their alleged anti-Trump bias, with the judge stating that the claims about this possible juror were “riddled with inaccuracies” — getting the name of the possible juror and the occupation of the possible juror wrong — and stating that any efforts to out any of the seated jurors “would not be tolerated.” Months ago, the judge placed a gag order on Stone, banning him from using social media to talk about the case. He violated her order, including by posting a picture of the judge with crosshairs next to her on Instagram.

Stone’s trial may last up to three weeks. If convicted, he could face 20 years behind bars.