The fact that the judge overseeing the Michael Flynn case has hired a personal attorney is "highly unprecedented" and may indicate he is "in trouble," a former Whitewater deputy independent counsel said Tuesday.
U.S. District Court Judge Emmet G. Sullivan moved to hire high-profile attorney Beth Wilkinson just as the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals is reviewing his order to not immediately grant the Justice Department's request to dismiss the case against Flynn, President Donald Trump's former national security adviser.
"I think what they're [U.S. appeals court] saying, [is] 'Judge, what are you doing? You better explain what you're doing,'" Sol Wisenberg said Tuesday on Fox News Channel's "Bill Hemmer Reports." "I interpret it as a flashing neon sign ... a wake-up call to him [to] explain what you're about because the moves he's made have been very, very unusual.
Sullivan was directed last week by the court of appeals to respond to a request by Flynn's lawyers by June 1, Fox News reported. The court also invited the government to respond "in its discretion within the same 10-day period.
Flynn initially pleaded guilty in the case, saying he had misled the FBI about his contacts with then-Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak following the 2016 presidential election. But he has since said he wants to withdraw the plea after the Justice Department said the FBI didn't have adequate grounds to interview him.
Sullivan declined to dismiss the case, instead appointing a retired federal judge to argue against the DOJ's position as well as consider whether Flynn should be held in criminal contempt of court for perjury.
"There's no question that what he seemed to be doing was delaying this process," Wisenberg told Fox, " and ... the D.C. Court of appeals [is] saying, 'You're going against clear law here. What are you doing?'"
Sullivan, he said, is "very popular" among the bar in D.C., and a "celebrity in legal circles." Sullivan used that celebrity status, Wisenberg said. "The only problem is the law doesn't let him do it."
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