In Vault 7 Trial CIA Leaking Schulte Medical Information to Amol Raised By Matthew Russell Lee, Patreon Thread

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SDNY COURTHOUSE, Feb 14 – A week before the trial of accused CIA leaker Joshua Schulte, set to begin February 3, a public hearing was held on January 27 about the US Attorney's requests to seal the courtroom for some witness and limited media attendance to a single pool reporter banned from reporting any physical characteristics of the CIA witnesses.

On this issue, Inner City Press before the public hearing filed three one-page letters in opposition, the last one here. At the end U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York Judge Paul A. Crotty asked Assistant US Attorney Matthew Laroche if his Office objected to live video feed to the SDNY Press Room, not showing the witnesses' faces. AUSA Laroche said no objection - which should mean feeds for this all other proceedings, when requested. On February 4, Inner City Press live-tweeted the opening arguments, here.

On February 13, before Judge Crotty adjourned the trial until February 18 when he said it will go past 3 pm to 3:30 or 4, Schulte's lawyer Sabrina Shroff questioned then-CIA supervisor Bonnie Bennett Stith about Schulte's personal medical information having somehow been leaked to his nemesis Amol:

"Mr. Schulte filed a complaint about the way he was being treated by Amol, correct? A. Yes. Q. And when he felt his complaint wasn't taken seriously, he escalated it, right? A. Yes...

Q. He went and got a protective order in a courtroom, correct? State courtroom, correct? A. Yes. Q. By the way, did you know at some point that people had actually gone to court? A. I was briefed on the fact that they had gone to court. Q. Did somebody get a transcript and see what was said in that proceeding? A. It was handed to our security. Q. OK. Let's go with that. Did security get you a transcript?

A. No. Q. You have two CIA employees going to a state court, correct? A. Uh-huh. Q. This is the last thing the CIA wants, am I right? A. I don't know that I'd call it the last thing, but it's not something that was done. Q. I mean, isn't it fair to say no company wants that headache? Right? Private, public, government, nobody wants that, right? A. I can't speak to that. Q. OK. Well, you didn't want that, did you? A. It wouldn't be my first choice, no. Q. OK. And security was in charge of this, correct? A. It was handed over to security. Q. Right. Security never got you a copy of the transcript, correct? A. No. Q. You have no idea what was even said by Amol in open court, correct? A. No.

Q. You have no idea if Amol actually told the judge that this man has been sent to counseling, correct? A. No.

Q. You do not know how Amol got that information, sitting here to this day, correct?

A. No. Q. And yet you think you knew the culture of EDG in April of 2016? A. Yeah - MS. SHROFF: I withdraw that.

Q. Let's just go back to the state complaint, shall we? Did you, by any chance, ever find out how Amol knew he was referred to therapy? A. No. Q. Did you ever try and tell Karen: Hey, you know, we may want to find out why these two people who are at each other know information that is upsetting to one developer, that is personal to one developer, how does Amol know this? Did you ever ask? A. No." Call it Spy Versus Spy. There was also a glimpse at how Stith and presumably other CIA witness are being prepped, more on Patreon here. Inner City Press will continue on the case.

On February 11, Shroff complained on the record to Judge Crotty that her requests to the CISO to have lawyers from the Federal Defendents admitted into the courtroom had been denied; she said this was another way in which Schulte is being denied his right to a public trial. Judge Crotty dismissed this complaint, saying he had already ruled on it. Inner City Press, so far asked to move off the 14th and even the 5th floor, will have more on this.

On February 10, after testimony that the CIA Agents called in for damage control were not allowed to visit Wikileaks' site on the Internet, Schulte's lawyers asked to preclude an expert witness... Inner City Press will stay on the case - watch this site.

Back on January 24, for which a feed was denied, an issue that arose was Schulte's letters complaining that his assigned counsel James M. Branden is not providing assistance of counsel. Now in the docket is a letter from Branden, dated January 24, stating that because of a hearing in White Plains he could not attend the final pre-trial conference for Schulte. Something is very wrong with this. And this:

A basic PACER search by Inner City Press finds that Schulte in April 2019 filed a civil lawsuit against the US Attorney General. There is a docket number: 19-cv-3346. Photo here.

But even on the SDNY Press Room PACER terminal when Inner City Press clicked on the Complaint, it replied, "You do not have permission to view this document." So who does? And is this a public court system? We will have more on this.

Assistant US Attorney Matthew Laroche argued that while prospective jurors will be shown witnesses real names, it will only by in hard copy and thereafter some 17 of them will be referred to by pseudonyms.

Shroff, still with the Federal Defenders for purposes of this case, insisted on calling these "fake names," and complained about the difficulties imposed in conducting basic research on potential witnesses.

See Inner City Press filing into the docket on Big Cases Bot, here. Watch this site. The case is US v. Schulte, 17-cr-548 (Crotty).

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