A federal judge on Tuesday ordered the deposition of a former State Department staffer who helped set up Hillary Clinton’s private email server to go forward and to be videotaped.
U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan denied a request by attorneys for technology specialist Bryan Pagliano to bar the recording of the deposition before lawyers with the conservative legal advocacy group Judicial Watch.
The group is seeking to have Pagliano answer questions under oath as part of its civil lawsuit probing whether Clinton’s email arrangement when she was secretary of state from 2009 to 2013 thwarted the Freedom of Information Act and the release of public records.
In his brief order, Sullivan said Pagliano’s videotaped deposition would be sealed consistent with other interviews. He asked the parties to pick a mutually agreed upon date before the end of June for the deposition, which originally had been planned for June 6.
“We’re pleased that it’s going forward and that the record is going to be complete. We thought it was important for the court to be able to judge the demeanor of the witness,” said Tom Fitton, president of Judicial Watch.
Pagliano’s attorneys argued against a video recording, saying it would subject Pagliano’s constitutionally protected statements to the risk of being manipulated into “soundbites” for political attacks.
Pagliano is one of half a dozen former State Department and Clinton aides ordered by Sullivan to give sworn testimony in a lawsuit concerning Judicial Watch’s 2013 records request for information concerning Clinton aide Huma Abedin’s employment arrangement.
Pagliano, who worked on Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign before setting up the server in her New York home in 2009, stated his intention to the court in early June to appear before Judicial Watch attorneys, but to not answer any questions, asserting his Fifth Amendment rights and claiming a “reasonable fear of prosecution.”
Pressed by Sullivan, Pagliano’s attorneys have said he was granted limited immunity by federal prosecutors in an ongoing Justice Department investigation into Clinton’s email set- up. They asked to disclose details of the limited immunity in a sealed filing to the judge alone.
The Washington Post reported in March that Pagliano reached the agreement in an ongoing FBI criminal investigation into the possible mishandling of classified information. The FBI has said it was responding to a referral from the inspectors general of the intelligence community and State Department.
On Friday, Justice Department attorneys weighed in supporting Pagliano, writing the court that “releasing Mr. Pagliano’s agreements with the United States could prematurely reveal the scope and focus of the pending investigation.”
Sullivan granted his request to file the agreements under seal. Sullivan said the “privacy interests at stake are high because the government’s criminal investigation” is ongoing and confidential.
Judicial Watch had asked Sullivan to make Pagliano’s immunity agreement public like other court filings, or at least to let its lawyers review it so they could narrowly tailor questions that would avoid the risk of criminal prosecution.
(c) 2016, The Washington Post ยท Spencer S. Hsu and Ann E. Marimow
