House Science Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R-Texas) is asking the Justice Department to seek charges against the CEO of a technology company for allegedly not turning over documents related to Hillary Clinton's emails. | AP Photo House panel wants Clinton e-mail firm CEO prosecuted for contempt

The chairman of a House committee is asking the Justice Department to seek criminal charges against a company chief tangled up in the controversy over Hillary Clinton's private email account.

House Science Committee Chairman Lamar Smith made the request Thursday for a criminal contempt of Congress prosecution against Platte River Networks CEO Treve Suazo for allegedly failing to turn over documents relating to the firm's storage of Clinton's emails after she left the State Department.


In a 15-page letter, the Texas Republican also asked Attorney General Jeff Sessions to consider charging Suazo with obstruction of justice and making false statements to Congress.

Smith said he hopes prosecutors will be more open to bringing charges under President Donald Trump's administration than they would have been during the previous administration.

"Failure to comply with duly issued subpoenas and obstruction of a congressional investigation will not be tolerated," Smith said. "With a new administration in place, I am hopeful that the Department of Justice will appropriately respond to the referral. We cannot allow companies with valuable information to stonewall us in our oversight efforts.”

An attorney for Denver-based Platte River, Ken Eichner, did not immediately reply to a request for comment on the development.

A Justice Department spokeswoman confirmed receipt of Smith's letter but had no further comment.

Several congressional committees probing Clinton's use of a private email server as secretary of state have been seeking records for nearly two years about Platte River's role in hosting Clinton's email system following her departure from the State Department in 2013. Many of the inquiries have focused on what security measures were in place and what evidence there was of hackers, foreign adversaries or others probing Clinton's email data.

At various times during last year's presidential campaign, Republican lawmakers accused Clinton and her lawyers of obstructing the probes and of instructing Clinton's service providers not to turn over relevant documents or offer testimony. Those in Clinton's camp said at the time that they were cooperating with the FBI investigation that was underway, but they never offered a full pledge of cooperation with the congressional probes.

Congressional aides said Thursday that Clinton's personal attorney David Kendall was involved in reviewing some documents provided by two other firms involved with the Clinton email set-up, Datto and Secnap. Smith's committee eventually reached an agreement with Kendall about what records would be provided to the panel, the aides said.

However, the aides said they were not clear on what role, if any Kendall played in orchestrating Platte River's response.

"We don’t know that Platte River definitely is coordinating with former Secretary Clinton, but certainly the other companies were," said one aide, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Hill staffers involved with the probe said the lack of clarity is in part because Platte River never turned over any records.

"They flatly refused to cooperate with our investigation through a series of letters and emails," one aide added. "We believe they purposely misinterpreted the terms of our subpoena to then say they didn't have any responsive materials."

Smith's move, which appears to have the blessing of House Speaker Paul Ryan, seems certain to trigger complaints from Democrats that the GOP is stirring up the email flap months after it was thoroughly litigated and addressed during the presidential campaign. Many Democrats blame media attention to Clinton's email practices, as well as FBI Director James Comey's handling of the related investigation, for her electoral loss.

Asked about such critiques, aides to Smith said he considers it an important matter of principle and precedent to vindicate the panel's prerogatives to obtain information in response to its subpoenas.

"In the course of that oversight and any investigation, for a party to simple refuse to comply with a validly issued congressional subpoena, allowing that to stand without sort of following up on it and getting the information the committee needs will harm future investigations," one staffer said.

However, the aide noted that Smith did not pursue some other potential contempt mechanisms, like a formal resolution that would go to the House floor to pursue civil litigation, formally demand a criminal prosecution or use the House's powers to jail recalcitrant witnesses.

"The chairman did think that would be dredging things up, perhaps, to a degree that wasn’t necessary," the aide said.

Smith's announcement of the criminal referral appeared to catch many Democrats by surprise. Some said Smith had indicated he was throwing in the towel on the email-focused probe.

"This caught us off guard," said one Democratic committee aide who requested anonymity. "A week after the election, majority staff told our oversight staff that the chairman was dropping this because he wanted to move on to other issues."

Kendall declined to comment on Smith's referral.

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FBI Director James Comey announced last July that he was not recommending any criminal charges in connection with Clinton's use of the private server, but he blasted Clinton and her aides for extreme carelessness in their handling of classified information exchanged on the private account.

During the FBI probe, Platte River staffer Paul Combetta was granted immunity by federal prosecutors in exchange for offering FBI investigators his account of how back-up copies of Clinton's personal emails were deleted in early 2015.

Combetta said Clinton aides requested deletion of Clinton's archive of personal emails in December 2014, after Clinton lawyers separated out what they believed were all potentially work-related messages. That deletion request came before Clinton had received any congressional subpoenas or preservation requests for her private email account, her aides say.

However, Combetta told the FBI that while he was aware of the request he had not deleted all copies of the personal messages. That prompted what the tech specialist colorfully called an, "Oh, s***!" moment after the issue hit the news in March 2015. He then securely wiped the messages from a back-up server.

Smith aides said they have reviewed many of the materials the FBI obtained during its investigation, including records from Platte River, but still believe the firm has more information that could be useful to the committee. For example, the panel wants detailed information on service "tickets" the firm created following specific indications of hacking attempts against Clinton's server, aides said.

Speaking of the records the FBI gathered, one Hill aide said: "I'm not sure they captured everything."

Criminal prosecutions for contempt of Congress have been rare in recent decades. Republican-led committees made a series of referrals to the Justice Department during President Barack Obama's time in office, but none of those resulted in charges.

In 2010, the Justice Department obtained an indictment of former baseball pitcher Roger Clemens not for contempt, but false statements, perjury and obstruction of justice for allegedly lying at a 2008 House hearing investigating steroid use. Clemens was acquitted.