It was the Roger Stone trial, so the circus was definitely in town—journalists, Trump supporters, cranks, and conspiracy theorists of every flavor—but this circus had an incongruously somber air. Stone arrived Friday morning at the E. Barrett Prettyman Courthouse in Washington, D.C., dressed in a tailored gray suit and a blue-and-white-striped button-down, facing charges of lying to Congress, obstructing justice, and witness tampering. Flanked by his wife, Nydia, who was draped in a blue two-piece ensemble; a man described as his spiritual adviser; and two other members of his ragtag entourage, the self-characterized “dirty trickster” seemed somewhat out of place as he toiled in the dozens-deep security line, looking like an expectant VIP waiting for an express pass.

In court the proceedings were similarly schizophrenic, veering between comedy and high seriousness, enforced by Judge Amy Berman Jackson. For three days federal prosecutors have laid out a meticulous case against Stone, one defined by a barrage of vicious text messages and missives between the longtime Republican operative and Randy Credico, the radio talk show host Stone is accused of trying to bully and threaten into silence; discussions of WikiLeaks and the Russian campaign to derail Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential bid; and Donald Trump and the reintroduction of past Trumpworld characters, including Steve Bannon. In many ways the trial has proven to be something of a relitigation of the investigation into whether the Trump campaign colluded with the Russian government to influence the presidential race, and the sort of Hollywood-esque spectacle Democrats hoped special counsel Robert Mueller’s testimony before Congress would be.

Unlike the trial of Paul Manafort in summer 2018, in which Trump was largely an elephant in the room, from the outset federal prosecutors repeatedly tied the president and his campaign to Stone. In their opening statement, federal prosecutors quickly made clear that Stone was in direct contact with then candidate Trump and his campaign officials about WikiLeaks and the timing and release of emails stolen from the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton campaign, speaking with him on numerous occasions about the email dumps during the summer of 2016. They argued that Stone’s decision to obfuscate his purported contacts with WikiLeaks and its founder,Julian Assange, to Congress was done to benefit Trump. “The evidence in this case will show that Roger Stone lied to the House Intelligence Committee because the truth looked bad for the Trump campaign and the truth looked bad for Donald Trump,” Aaron Zelinsky, an assistant U.S. attorney and veteran of the Mueller probe, declared in court Wednesday.

Credico, with his therapy dog, is a shambling figure, sometimes funny on purpose but more often inadvertently. But his testimony was particularly damaging for Stone. Over two days federal prosecutors had Credico, who fidgeted throughout, painstakingly read dozens upon dozens of text and email exchanges between him and Stone, many of which were punctuated with expletives, insults, and threats. “He wanted me to go along with this narrative,” Credico said of Stone. “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 piece of shit,” Stone said in one exchange, in reference to Credico’s dog, Bianca. “Prepare to die cocksucker,” the longtime ratfucker wrote to Credico in another series of text messages.

The appearance of Steve Bannon in the 2 p.m. hour on Friday made it feel like the courtroom had beamed back to 2016. Between mentions of the infamous Access Hollywood tape, polls, and the odds in Clinton’s favor, Bannon testified that Stone was viewed by himself and others on the campaign as the conduit to WikiLeaks. “The campaign had no official access to WikiLeaks or to Julian Assange. But Roger would be considered if we needed an access point—an access point because he had implied or told me that he had a relationship with WikiLeaks and Julian Assange,” Bannon, who served as the CEO of the Trump campaign in the twilight of the presidential election and went on to work in the White House, said.