Roger Stone, a longtime informal adviser to President Trump, denied that messages he sent to Randy Credico, a witness in special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe, were designed to intimidate him, instead saying they were taken out of context and cherrypicked.
Stone responded Friday in a CNN interview to a report from the network that Mueller had copies of a trove of messages Stone sent to Credico. Sources told CNN federal investigators are examining the messages and speaking to witnesses to determine whether Stone, though his communications with Credico, tried to intimidate or harass his longtime friend, raising the possibility he engaged in witness tampering or obstruction of justice.
“To take three text messages out of thousands really shows no context,” Stone told CNN. “These are the late-night ravings between two grumpy old men who have been friends for almost 20 years.”
Stone identified Credico, a New York comedian, as his intermediary to WikiLeaks and its founder, Julian Assange. But Credico has denied Stone’s claim.
In one exchange between Stone and Credico, Stone reacted to the revelation that Credico had been subpoenaed by the special counsel.
“Waste of your time — tell him to go fuck himself,” Stone told Credico of Mueller.
In another message from Stone to Credico, Stone says, “You backstab your friends — run your mouth my lawyers are dying Rip you to shreds. I’m going to take that dog away from you. Not a fucking thing you can do about it either because you are a weak broke piece of shit.”
Stone told CNN other messages between the two are omitted, including one where Credico tells Stone he should be willing to go to jail rather than out Credico as his source and another where Stone urges Credico to tell the truth.
“They are friendly, they’re vulgar, they’re vicious, they’re nasty, they’re ribald, but they’re not serious, therefore they’d have to be seen in context,” Stone said.
He went on to assert that there “was no effort to intimidate or coerce Randy Credico to do anything other than the truth.”
“These cannot be taken seriously,” Stone said. “We’ve been friends for 20 years. They’re all over the map. They have to be seen in totality.”
Stone also said federal investigators have all of his text messages, emails, and phone records.
