The lawyers for Reality Winner, the alleged leaker of a top-secret National Security Agency report, issued a new court filing Friday following the release of memos by fired FBI Director James Comey to make the case for their client to be set free.
The attorneys point to parts in the memos in which Comey describes meetings with President Trump in 2017. During that time, Trump was complaining about leaks, and Comey replied that he was “eager to find leakers and would like to nail one to the door as a message.”
Another memo said that Trump suggested reporters would make new friends in jail.
“I said something about the value of putting a head on a pike as a message,” Comey wrote.
Winner’s lawyers said that she didn’t have a chance because of such hardline attitudes towards cracking down on leakers from top administration officials.
“With the extraordinary pressure coming from the highest parts of the executive branch to aggressively pursue leakers, the FBI was simply never going to allow Ms. Winner to walk out the door,” they wrote.
Winner is accused of leaking an NSA report on Russia’s alleged use of hacking techniques to access election materials, documents that were marked “top secret.” She was arrested June 3 and indicted under the Espionage Act on one count of unauthorized disclosure of classified information. She has been denied bail and her trail is set for Oct. 15, 2018.
Her attorneys previously asked for her statements that day to be suppressed because she was not read her Miranda rights.
